Ron Paul. Libertarianism. The mid-far right wing

[wubblegurl]

Sorry, but am I missing something?

does anyone else notice the OVERWHELMING precense and support from some very unsavoury idealogical and political views.
I'm not interested in argueing with anyone _Truelight but...is this really the forum concensus (or the politically a-apathetic [pathetic's]) views?

 

[Eriny]

I'm not a libertarian. I guess a summary of my opinion in general political matters in that businesses should not be economically protected, but people should. So, I think that education and health should be paid for (not necessarily provided) by the state through progressive taxation. In terms of personal freedoms (as in, should people be able to take drugs and such) I don't know. I think too much leniency in these areas serve to ignore a host of underlying social problems, but not enough leniency is bad as well and imposes on people's rights and makes criminal something that is actually not such a big deal.

[TrueLight]

lol im not going to argue ....actually in fact i was thinking about starting a topic like this...
but i would question the word "unsavoury"
but yeah i dig his views...obviously..
and i would also question the conventional left-right spectrum as discussed in this topic http://vcenotes.com/forum/index.php/topic,16349.0.html

[Collin Li]

I'd say a lot of 07ers and 08ers who saw debates that Brendan and I featured in were more or less swayed towards that end (with varying degrees), yes. I'd cite Excalibur as a prime example - he can accept/refute if he likes

Many 'liberal' minds have come and gone though.

The rest are politically apathetic.

[TrueLight]

just to ur first part collin

the funny thing is... i never really got into brendan views or maybe i didn't care... or urs lol i wasn't really into politics or any of that

i kind of just discovered it just before the obama election yr... and then i saw debates etc... and saw ron paul talking and i was like WO this guy is awesome ... and then it kinda one thing lead to another... and then i started looking back at things u said and brendan and im like i was so stupid back then lol

[Collin Li]

Yeah, you came and started pasting links after most political debates died down, haha.

[TrueLight]

lol yeah cause im really interested in them so oh well whoever wants to look at them can...

[slothpomba]

Is it me or is this forum mostly true light talking to himself?

[Collin Li]

Is it me or is this forum mostly true light talking to himself?

It used to be good until debates were spread over three other boards (Educational, News & Pol, Rants/Debates)

[TrueLight]

"this forum" i don't argue/debate with myself..

[Eriny]

I think I lost interest in debates because I was kind of sick of saying the same thing over and over. At a certain point, trying to convince something that is based on an ideology that they don't believe in is really impossible.

For instance, someone might take away my pen and I ask for it back, they say 'no' and I say 'that's not fair'. Now, if they say, 'life isn't fair' then they are actually, at some point, agreeing with my ideological statement that life ought to be 'fair' and can so I can say something like 'no, it isn't always fair, but that's something that we both strive for and you are able to best off giving me my pen back if you want to promote its existence.'
But if they were to say 'it's stupid to be fair', they're kind of arguing outside my own ideological reasoning, and then there is really nothing you can do.

The only debates that can ever come to some kind of resolution (though not necessarily the most interesting debates) is if the people are arguing within the same ideology. Another example: 'We shouldn't use preferential voting, everyone should only tick one box and whoever gets the most, wins.' This can come to some kind of conclusion assuming that both parties are arguing about which system is most fair/democratic/amusing/whatever, but it totally wouldn't work if one party was arguing for something on the basis that one system was fair, and the other party was arguing on the basis that the other system would help create a dictatorship.

I think ideologies are sometimes almost a kind of 'first philosophy' for people, because they assume the ideology through all their opinions and such, but if we ask ourselves 'why is democracy so great?' 'why is freedom so great?', etc., ultimately, we're just appealing to the ideology itself rather than anything beyond it. Freedom is good because I don't believe people should be imprisoned, democracy is so great because I think peach person should have an equal say in how the country is run, and so on.

[Collin Li]

Brendan and I would appeal to particular values (that form an ideology)

Such as freedom.

And brendan was great at showing in many cases that if you're for this, then the policy you want wont even result in it, and is possibly detrimental to your cause.

[excal]

I'd say a lot of 07ers and 08ers who saw debates that Brendan and I featured in were more or less swayed towards that end (with varying degrees), yes. I'd cite Excalibur as a prime example - he can accept/refute if he likes

Many 'liberal' minds have come and gone though.

The rest are politically apathetic.

I still consider myself very much a centrist, but with a much greater appreciation on the concept of freedom. Perhaps you can say that I'm less centre-left that I once was.

[Eriny]

Brendan and I would appeal to particular values (that form an ideology)

Such as freedom.

And brendan was great at showing in many cases that if you're for this, then the policy you want wont even result in it, and is possibly detrimental to your cause.

Yes, brendan did do this a lot, but his logical premises weren't always too good. I remember the 'flick the switch' debate, which went something like, if you believe in fairness then if you could flick a switch to get everyone having equal money in a manner that rich people would lose lots of money and that money would not be redirected anywhere, then you would. But 'fairness' these days is more about providing opportunities rather than strictly outcomes (e.g. offer everyone education, but you can't control what they're going to do with this opportunity), additionally, it is 'unfair' to strip people of opportunities, especially if they worked hard to create their opportunities. So really, fairness doesn't work like that at all. I can see how equality might though.

Brendan was very good at telling everyone what they should believe, yes.

[slothpomba]

Or you could just use violence [worked for the roman empire]