@astheroth I think there's plenty of people on fedi, but you could always try just making them.
@SneedsterSpeedster @sevvie @astheroth

> Taxation is unironicaly not theft.

Where would you get such an idea?
@SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @sevvie Either "I have received a benefit" is orthogonal or running a protection racket is not theft, either. The exchange doesn't appear to be voluntary in either case.

Total federal budget, FY2021: $2.3 trillion
Department of Transportation budget, FY2021: $88.7 billion (3.9%)
Department of Defense budget, FY2021: $705.4 billion (30.7%)


(Maybe eventually the technology for asphalt will fall into civilian hands and it will be possible for any organization to build a road or a railroad. Alas, the secret to road-building is only known to the federal government and if we don't drone-strike enough people or spend $8.2 billion on making people take off their shoes at the airport--TSA's under the DHS, is from their $51.9 billion, separate from the DOD budget above--then we also can't have roads. The budgets for the CIA and NSA are, of course, classified.)
@p @astheroth @sevvie
I'm just making up bullshit, however, it doesn't seem to me that taxation is theft, legally, becuase the laws determine what isn't and is theft, and they haven't determined that taxation is theft.
@SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @sevvie

> it doesn't seem to me that taxation is theft, legally

Who said "legally"?

> becuase the laws determine what isn't and is theft

This is circular, man. Think about what you have to mean if you are going to describe a law as unjust. The law is a reflection of principle, not a definition.

@p@freespeechextremist.com @SneedsterSpeedster@kiwifarms.cc @astheroth@freespeechextremist.com @sevvie@silkhe.art

The law would never define itself as theft, and thus illegal.

Logically, there's no way to get around the idea that putting a gun to someone's head and taking their stuff is theft. Whether they gain a benefit from that theft or not is immaterial. There is little difference between this and tax, except that the State does it and you only see the guy with a gun if you refuse

@wolfie @p @sevvie @astheroth
If you define theft as taking something from someone involuntary, then I'll concede that taxation is theft.

@SneedsterSpeedster@kiwifarms.cc @p@freespeechextremist.com @sevvie@silkhe.art @astheroth@freespeechextremist.com What good would one get? I'm not sure a vague "services" would work in this case as generally speaking, that would only apply to services specifically requested

@wolfie @p @sevvie @astheroth
Instead of beating around the bush, can you give me an argument that theft always is wrong?
@p @astheroth @sevvie @wolfie If someone is starving to death, then stealing food is probably the moral thing to do.
@SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie I’d find a man competent enough to give me food regardless of the circumstances. Grow it ffs, stop with these nigger hypotheticals.
@bot @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie

Hypotheticals are the intelligent mans way to argue. The argument goes something like this:

1. If stealing is always wrong, then it's wrong to steal when you are about to starve to death.
2. It's not wrong to steal when you are about to starve to death.
C: Stealing is not always wrong.

The argument, in prop logic goes something like this:
S: stealing is always wrong.
W: it's wrong to steal when you are about to starve to death.

1. S --> W
2. -W
C: -S

So the argument is valid.
@SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie no, the argument is autistic. The primary motivation of every life is to survive and reproduce. If you are stealing from others, you are a nigger. If you are a nigger, then you may as well kill yourself. Try to follow that logic.

It is wrong to steal from others regardless of the circumstances. Practically speaking, you don’t know their circumstances, so you may be leading them to starvation too.

It’s niggers all the way down basically. Have some respect yourself and go to the gym.
@SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie you think that because your autism is preventing you from seeing other options. “I have no other option but to be a wage cuck or a thieving nigger.”
@bot @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie
You are being evasive.
In normal circumstances, when you have other options, that prevent you from starving to death, then stealing is wrong.
When you say that stealing is always wrong, then you say that stealing is wrong in every possible situation, which leads to absurdities.
@SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie I’m not evading anything, I’ve answered what you’ve asked.

Reality isn’t a game of formal logic. The lower middle class chad prepper will probably outlive the wealthy soy cuck autist thinking about his next Funko Pop.
@bot @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie
You're position is that it's always wrong to steal, this includes situations were the entire universe explodes if someone doesn't steal one funko pop. You are then having a hard time understanding hypotheticals and meme about how there's other options, not included in the hypothetical, which is not relevant to the argument.
@SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @p @sevvie @wolfie ok, then just admit you’re having a meaningless autistic argument that is completely detached from reality.

It won’t just be one person stealing during a crisis, and that will cause the shop to close its doors. What happens then?
@bot @SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @sevvie @wolfie You can hop into any discussion of ethics and say "If you get nuked, none of this matters" but it has never been useful to do so.

> It won’t just be one person stealing during a crisis, and that will cause the shop to close its doors.

"What is the right thing for me to do?" and "What should I tolerate others doing to me?" are questions that, depending on how everyone answers them, can decide whether or not there's a crisis.
@p @astheroth @SneedsterSpeedster @wolfie @sevvie that’s not what I said though. Maybe I shouldn’t have stifled their discussion, but my point was that it’s always immoral and probably never justified.

If your own actions lead to your demise, that’s your responsibility. Individuals aren’t always responsible for the circumstances they find themselves in, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t alternatives to stealing.
@bot @SneedsterSpeedster @astheroth @sevvie @wolfie

> Individuals aren’t always responsible for the circumstances they find themselves in, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t alternatives to stealing.

Of course you want to avoid stealing if at all possible, but the example is the example. You can't really solve the Trolley Problem by saying "What if I just untie everyone?" It's not useful, the point is to consider whether it's ethical to switch the track, given the example as-is. So I've said taxation is theft, then the question of "Is theft always wrong?" pops up, I don't want to contest that, but I think it's orthogonal to the question of whether taxation is theft.

There exist scenarios in which something may be theft but it may be moral to do so. If you can steal a tank from an aggressive invading army at night, I think no one but the invading army (and maybe its local sympathizers) would condemn you. If you had the opportunity to do so, then it might be wrong not to steal the tank, and cut a few throats on the way if you can.

So, someone's starving to death, maybe they think of stealing food as so unethical that they'd rather die if those were the only two options. Maybe they've got kids, they'll even let their kids die rather than steal. Maybe they'd rather steal. I wouldn't fault a starving person for stealing enough food to survive, assuming that was the only option. (I'd fault anyone that saw that guy on the brink of death and didn't give him a burger, you know, but that's yet another question.) You could certainly say that in the civilized world in $current_year, being on the brink of starvation means you probably made about a million bad decisions along the way, but once you're at that point, you can't really go back and fix those.
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