Curtis Yarvin on Why He Isn't a Libertarian 

Hoppe is not a monarchist; his thesis in “Democracy the god that failed” is that monarchy is better than democracy. But Hoppe considers himself an anarcho-capitalist.

The root problem with libertarianism is the idea that people will leave you alone and are good enough to actually do so. In the end libertarians must intervene in order to get the desired result

This guy's um's are AGGRESSIVE

Like a lot of brilliant people, Yarvin sounds only a hair away from being clinically insane.

I really liked this explanation: "Here is the Carlylean roadmap for the Misesian goal. Spontaneous order, also known as freedom, is the highest level of a political pyramid of needs. These needs are: peace, security, law, and freedom. To advance order, always work for the next step-without skipping steps. In a state of war, advance toward peace; in a state of insecurity, advance toward security; in a state of security, advance toward law; in a state of law, advance toward freedom. _ "The Newtonian envelope of libertarianism is the last of these stages. Once the state of lawful government is reached, that state can generally improve itself by minimizing its interventions and applying a policy of laissez-faire-advancing from enforced to spontaneous order. With the caveat, of course, that this policy not jeopardize the more important achievements of peace, security, and law. _ "When a state finds itself outside this Newtonian window, however, Mises and Rothbard are of no assistance whatsoever in helping it get back in. Worse: Rothbardian libertarianism can be a positive hindrance to the Carlylean roadmap. _ "Consider the first stage of restoring order: peace. In war, advance to peace. [...] _ "Therefore, in many cases peace can be achieved only in the Roman way: by victory. As with all military objectives, victory is achieved by any means necessary. Including artillery. Clearly, if the enemy uses artillery and you don’t, your chances of victory are greatly reduced. _ "But the libertarian artillery officer faces a serious moral dilemma. Does artillery violate the natural rights of the target? I would say: the entire purpose of artillery is to violate the natural rights of the target. Clearly, if you could get your hands on the people your artillery is pointed at, and subject them to a full and fair judicial trial for whatever their offenses may be, you would have no need at all for artillery. Since you have no means by which to achieve this, you subject them to a 120-mm shell instead. Hence violating their natural rights-with both blast and shrapnel. When they may have committed no offenses at all. Boom! Hey, man, that hurt. _ "This is war: inter arma silent leges. Or so the Romans believed. One can, of course, reverse this axiom-just as Einstein himself, on so many bumper stickers, reversed si vis pacem, para bellum. When reversing millennium-old proverbs, be sure to expect the reverse results. Perhaps they won’t happen; in that case, you’ll be pleasantly surprised. _ "Similarly, once outright military conflict is ended, peace is established. But mere peace is a low state of order. In peace, the state must work toward security. _ A state is secure if it maintains a monopoly of coercion. Security does not mean the absolute absence of crime, i.e., private coercion; this is unachievable, because crime cannot be universally preempted. Security does mean the absolute absence of systematic or organized crime, as well as the absence of any other systematic resistance to state authority-from banditry to tax protest, terrorism to “civil disobedience.” _ "And how does this resistance become “absent?” Well, of course, it does not do so on its own. Oh, no! Au contraire, mon frère! In certain rare instances, systematic crime can be legalized, and thus become orderly. Indeed, if the state’s orders are physically unenforceable, it should reconsider them. It cannot outlaw the moon. Marijuana laws are perhaps a case of this-not due to the harmlessness of the drug, but the hardiness of the plant. _ "Otherwise, alas. Security is achieved when resistance is crushed. The use of artillery in this process should be unnecessary. If you need artillery, you are probably still working on the peace stage. On the other hand, the assumption that all security problems, in all cases, can be resolved by the use of rights-preserving judicial procedures, is entirely unwarranted. _ "Here we meet a good old friend, martial law-yet another traditional attribute of sovereignty recognized for millennia, yet strangely forgotten in the late 20th century. Martial law is no law at all, of course, but the arbitrary will of a military commander. It is really martial order. And there are countries in the world-quite a few, in fact-that need martial order, the way a camel that’s just walked across Libya needs a glass of water. [...] _ "Once again, attempts to achieve law before security simply disrupt the task of achieving security. Once security is achieved, however, law provides the inestimable boon of safety from state actors, as well as independent bandits. If official actions are lawful, they are predictable. If they are predictable, a rational person can predict them, and thus avoid infringing them. Martial “law,” by its very nature, can provide no such guarantee. _ "Finally, once the rule of law is achieved, the government can relax its sphincter, let down its hair, slouch a little, have a beer, and let people do what they want. It can replace enforced order with spontaneous order. It can minimize its intrusions and interventions-since it knows there is no danger that freedom will develop into disorder. _ "Thus applying libertarian principles of natural rights, outside the Newtonian envelope, moves a state not toward the libertarian goal of spontaneous order, but away from it-i.e., toward chaos, defeat, and destruction. Because its enemies use artillery, and it doesn’t. Its enemies do not bother with trials, and it does. Etc. Therefore it is weak, and cannot produce any order at all, spontaneous or otherwise. _ "Whereas to a libertarian, freedom is no more than the absence of tyranny. To achieve freedom, defeat tyranny-i.e., any government that violates natural rights. You can see how this rule, while virtuous in some cases, in others becomes a spanner in the Carlylean works, because a Carlylean artillerist may violate quite a few natural rights on his way to order." www.unqualified-reservations.org/2010/02/from-mises-to-carlyle-my-sick-journey/

Hoppe doesn't say monarchy is "real libertarianism", only that it is better than democracy.

A medieval peasant had less interference with their lives by the king than a modern person by the federal government. Change my mind.

"Every era of history is equal in the eyes of God" Very similar to a quote from Chesterson... "Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead."

I think I just realized something about myself. I'm stupid. I try to keep with the conversation but they seem to jump from one book they read to another without addressing anything.

We have to define libertarianism is Rothbard a libertarian is Hoppe a libertarian? I feel like I have to leave this quote from the Introduction of Demcracy The God That Failed where Hoppe says: "Despite the comparatively favorable portrait presented of monarchy, I am not a monarchist and the following is not a defense of monarchy. Instead, the position taken toward monarchy is this: If one must have a state, defined as an agency that exercises a compulsory territorial monopoly of ultimate decisionmaking (jurisdiction) and of taxation, then it is economically and ethically advantageous to choose monarchy over democracy. But this leaves the question open whether or not a state is necessary..."

a real gem of an interview

"do Not read Hayek" is advice for smart people who will eventually read Mises. for the rest of us, go ahead and read Hayek, you'll never get thru Mises anyway.

Hoppe didn't say absolute monarchy is the purist form of libertarianism, he said it's Superior to democracy. Wtf

Curtis' explanation on the connection of absolute monarchy and libertarianism is so convoluted. It seems like he gave no real answer.

He didn't say anything

Expected the interview to bust out a "Yeah, that's deep man!" anytime!

Three reasons Yarvin is not a libertarian: 1. "And this is the first reason I am not a libertarian. Libertarianism is, more or less, basically, the ideology of the American Revolution. And the American Revolution was, in my own personal opinion, more or less, basically, a criminal outrage of the mob-led by leaders who were either unscrupulous, deluded, or both. [...] _ 2. "And this is the second reason I am not a libertarian: because, by defining libertarianism as an ethical imperative, libertarians assign themselves an unsolvable problem and proceed not to solve it. [...] _ "In my opinion, the practical problem with grounding libertarianism in the ideals of the American Revolution is that Americans no longer hold those ideals, and Europeans never did. _ "The response of many libertarians, especially those who for some awful, unimaginable reason seem to have congregated in the watershed of the Potomac, is often to borrow a trick from the Fabian Society, and try to steer Washington gradually and moderately in the direction of smaller and freer government. _ "They should know better. As we’ll see shortly, the monotonic growth pattern of the State is not a coincidence. It is one thing to surf that wave. It is another to paddle out through the breaker. When we look at the results of 25 years of Beltway libertarianism, we see hardly any substantive policy achievements. I’m sure there are some. But I can’t think of any. _ "And when we compare even their most aggressive visions to the set of changes that a return to the literal text of the Constitution, let alone a Rothbardian anarchy, would involve, we see the essentially decorative nature of the Beltway libertarians. I’m sure they have a lot of fun trying. But inevitable failure is no service to any cause. _ "I mean, why in God’s name would anyone come to the conclusion that the US political system is in some sense reformable? Talk about the triumph of hope over experience. _ 3. "And this is the third reason I’m not a libertarian: because I’m an engineer. I find libertarian government an extremely desirable outcome. In just a second, we will look at other ways to achieve this outcome. However, as a moral imperative, or a political design, or a historical tradition, libertarianism does not strike me as an effective means to this end." www.unqualified-reservations.org/2007/12/why-i-am-not-libertarian/

This interview should have been titled "Curtis Yarvin on why 'um' he isn't 'um' a Libertarian 'um.'

It was Kong Zi, rather than Lao Zi, that said that about the dour and passive emperor, if I'm not mistaken.

I feel the blues.

I'll accept correction, but I think it was Herder not Ranke that said all cultures are "equidistant from God."

this dude looks exactly like mencius modlbug am i missing something?

I love, love Curtis Yarvins opinions. That being said. The internet has made people feel too full of sugary information. Case in point. U.s. mail service. I've never had an issue with my mail. In 38 years. Maybe a mistake here and there. But life isn't perfect. Duh. Thus, in my pre internet mind, the US mail works for me. Simple. No theories, no break downs, no negativity, no politics, no 65 levels of overthinking horseshit garbage OVER analyzing bullshit. I use the postal mail. It works for me. I pay taxes on it. Problem solved. It's sometimes about perspective. Honestly it is. Horrible people, who NEVER see the shaded glasses they wear, will continue to never pay attention to those glasses, they just keep switching glasses, Is America fucked? Or do we think America is fucked?

Thaddeus just said in another video I just watched that he is a libertarian. This guy is so confusing

Just ran into these idea's espoused by Mr. Moldbug, and I too have many questions- I see that socialism and libertarianism has the same fatal flaw- that their (my) ideas require an already built house. The structure has to already be in place; a factory must be up and running for socialists or freedoms must already have been won by those who more than likely were not libertarian, before their (my) ideas can take shape. It is this pursuit of power- the need to take it so one can see the "correct way" enthroned and thwart all "wrong-ways" from gaining said power. Whether it is the technocrat, the common despot, or the lunatic partisan a tyranny will be made by small number over the many. The solutions are what I am interested in, and moving back to monarchy is not acceptable. But I too have thought long on "Who will watch the Watchers watching the Watchers watch the Watchers, ad infinitum?" Once you pick a point and say, "Here is the last stop. This were were the decisions will be made."; well then everyone of those listed tyrants are going to scramble to get on that train which is headed to end of the line. Power begets tyrants- how do you minimize it?

I have same bicycle poster...

Mises was a genius... yet he was a Liberal which has been what we called Libertarian pre-Rothbard. Rothbard and Hoppe disagreed with the genius, yet Curtis, I guess, bought the revised line.

It's not a terrible critique, much better than most you hear. I think the counter would be that most who staunchly believe in libertarian principles accept the inherent risk and dangers that come with it i.e. global pandemic response (because tyrannical governments did such a good job right?)

Human Pop Art! I love it!!!

To all who think that absolute monarchy were this great, untested idea, move to North Korea and find out whether the things that suck in America are absent there and whether they are replaced by something better.

The fundamental question behind what politic we should have is: When things go wrong( which they will!), what politic will you rather have? Tyranny, despots, fascism , or gridlock of democracy? Aristotle rightly pointed out that democracy is preferable above anything else. Ideals of politics should not control what politic we should have.

I don't think Hoppe said monarchy is the way. He said it is still a state, but is better than the modern state, which goes into debt, because the debt isn't privately owned, and goes to war that involves the entire society. But I think Hoppe preferred a totally private law society to monarchy. I don't think Hoppe would call himself a monarchist.

Isn't Thaddeus Russell the same guy that said post birth abortions should be legal?

💯💯💯💯💯💯

You know... you know... you know

I accept the posted speed limit as the law. Not a suggestion. I find that many people of all political persuasions ignore that simple law. And at some point try to convince me that they have things figured out and the other guy doesn't. Ever notice that? The stupid of us? Telling us what's up?

This guy falls all over his words

You dont need a pop shield for an sm58. There is a pop shield built in. So triggered.

Amotz Zahavi.

Same hand that can lift the telephone pole also has the power to knock it over. You solved nothing.

Hoppe does not say that absolute monarchy is libertarianism. Hoppe says that absolute monarchy is preferable to democracy. This guy doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about.

Literally not a single argument was provided. Extremely disappointing.

he jabbers incoherently at times, confidently, giving the illusion of a compelling argument. mostly an illusion though.

Er, Um... Cycles Perfecta.

this guy is okay. not great. just okay. hopefully we find his caesar. im doubtful.

um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um hoppe um um um um um um um um um um um um um um um

and um

Wow, talk about misunderstanding Hoppe! "Monarchism is the real libertarianism"? WTF! Total BS. All Hoppe says is monarchism is better than democracy, but he is CLEARLY an anarcho-capitalist who advocates for no state at all, monarchist or otherwise.

Something he may have overlooked about the Laozi argument is that Daoist philosophical ideas consistently failed when they were applied in the Han and Tang dynasties and more importantly chinese naturalist philosophy is also commonly viewed as causing the fall of the Ming to the Manchurian invaders. It seems a bit foolish to use a failed philosophical concept as part of the basis of a political ideology.

What he is, is incoherent-albeit fun to listen to.

you know...

To summarise: um ummmm um um um ummmm....

It's not ok to threaten to kill or steal from people because they don't do what you want.

um um um um

Notice how he uses the childish word ‘government’ and not the ‘State’

Bad arguments. Pass.

TLDR; "I worry that it won't work well in emergencies," meh