Are libertarians our enemies?

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You actually don't think I have the right to keep my own private property? Seriously?

So even if I work hard and honestly for someone, so that I can get enough money to buy a plot of land in the woods, and then work even harder to build a house, it is still not mine? Even though I worked honestly, bought the land honestly, and built the house honestly?

I'm not advocating for a genocide, I'm advocating that thieves go do something else instead of steal. If that includes dying, so be it, as long as they don't take away from others what is not rightfully theirs.

OK, I should have used a different article, but the point still stands, there is a gun to your head, whether you like it or not. I refer you to my earlier post which if I recall correctly was sent to The Walrus.

Does someone need a hug?

Property rights mean nothing without the government acknowledging and enforcing them. Otherwise, who's going to defend you if armed men come and kick you out of your home? Sure, you can fight them off in a gun battle, but there's more of a chance that you'll either die or be hurt, not mention your property will be damaged. It makes more sense to have publicly funded police protecting you in the first place. Or what if your neighbor builds a house on your property? Without government, there's be no court system to right that wrong. The simple fact is, private property means jack without the existence of government.

Huh, I didn't know you were an expert on the Norwegian taxation system. The government gathers money and decides what to use it for in the state budget. It is true that car owners end up paying a lot more than other people when it comes to road taxes and such things, but in the end, a bit of my money ends up to collective transportation or road building.

Also, competition does work in road building, you just have to build the road first, and build a road that fulfills the needs, but that's really just for the major roads, you also have the smaller ones, stuff like driveways and roads leading up to houses.

What do you mean toll stations at road junctions is inefficient? Just use electronic systems like Autopass. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autopass

Yep, competition between different roads is a theme of Snow Crash. Each road is not only a corporation but also a sovereign microstate.

People in Snow Crash don't pay to have private roads built for them. Not everyone can own their own road. They pay tolls. People don't get to decide which roads get built individually, not even by voting with their dollars. If Road Inc has one road that I need to use but they're using my tolls to fund construction of another road I think is unnecessary, I don't get to tell them what to do with their corporation. I could choose not to use their road but if it's runs past my house I'll be a shut-in.

Not all the funds from tolls would be used for maintenance or to pay back construction costs of that particular road. It's common corporate practice that most of the profits go to expanding the business, not maintaining it.

Anyway, Road Inc doesn't get to build roads where ever it likes. In a world where each road, suburb and strip mall is a sovereign microstate, zoning disputes can get very heated. There can also be conflicts of interest. In the book, a section of Fairlanes Inc is bought by a mall and redirected into their labyrinthine parking system, confusing by design. You can attempt to drive through to the other side if you want but it's easier to just park and shop. The plan was implemented to prevent shoppers from driving through to rival malls.

Normally competition between malls would lead to lower prices but this mall has a large section of LA to itself, leaving them free to jack up the prices. This fictional example illustrates how, while the free market can lead to increased competition and lower prices, it can also reduce competition which leads to higher prices.

Remember, if some CEO is talking about how competition leads to lower prices, he may be plotting to set up a monopoly.

I disagree, a lot of people do go and interfere with other peoples lives for a laugh (although, it is much more common for people to do it so that they can feel like they have done a nice thing/helped someone). I think that most of the time they do it for personal gain. People like to have their will imposed on others, it makes them feel powerful, and it's always nice to have "I did X important thing when I was in parliament" on your CV or whatever.

But what people can do on their own land is their business, though. In the first place, it's not in the best interest of a house owner to get on bad terms with their neighbors. I'd like to point out that how people build their houses is not the biggest problem, I'm more worried if people can afford to do so or not because their money is taken away by the state, or if they're even allowed to build a house in the first place.

You don't need private roads for that. It's very common for the government to use private contractors when they want to build a public road or a public building.

There's already plenty of competition between construction companies to get sought-after government contracts. Just because a road is state property that doesn't mean it has to be built directly by government workers. So if you want competition between construction companies, there's no need to privatize all the roads. Building a road and administrating it are two different things.

Of course road building is expensive, its a very labor intensive process and requires a lot of expensive materials and tools. No single individual is going to build a highway, it would most likely be something like city A and city B getting together and saying "we want a road to go between us", and then people can put money in the pot to get advantages on the road use, like exclusive access during certain hours or lower toll price.

Companies have reputations to protect, it's not in their best interest to be known as "that company who sells faulty pacemakers" or "that company whose roads falls apart after three years". People are not all helpless, some people know to look up the people they are doing business with.

Dude, just to let you know, I'm impressed by what a lot of Libertarians are saying,I'm just a person who believes in mixed economies, and who doesn't hold fast to any particular ideology.

I'd be interested in hearing more of what you had to say.

You never said Norway explicitly, but you did say "That's all what your libertarian wet dream will get you if put into practice." My libertarian dream is a free Norway, and you said it would turn into a country very similar to Somalia. I also explained to you that I shouldn't have to move away from the place I was born to have people stop stealing from me.

Also, I'm not really insulted, I just feel like I should be. If you people (the ones advocating theft) are feeling insulted when I'm saying "stop stealing from me," what can I say? "deal with it"? I don't want to be rude, but I'm just saying "stop stealing from me".

It depends: Are you a cute girl? If no, I'd rather pass up on the hug. I'm not really a touchy feely guy in the first place.

I still wouldn't bet on a city having enough money through voluntary donations to build a road, especially if the city is poor.
And no, people aren't helpless - that's why they enacted government regulation to keep business on the straight and narrow. The history of business prior to government regulation is fraught with abuse.

If armed men come and kick me out of my home, I will detonate the explosives I have rigged all throughout my house (or gas, if I feel like I have to save my material possessions). Or, I would fight. "cold dead hands" etc etc etc... Really though, it's up to the individual to protect themselves. As stated earlier in this thread, "you're not entitled to safety". If my neighbor builds a house on my property, I will thank him for the gift, and use it for maybe something like a greenhouse... If he tries to claim something he put on my property on purpose as his own, I will tell him to sod off, and if he does not sod off, I will force him off my property, if he does not comply then, I will have to shoot him. Such is life when people invade your rightfully owned land...

In the first place, I doubt any of those things would happen. An armed society is a polite society.

This is a long post. it is four in the morning here, I will come back tomorrow for another round of Denpa Vs the Wrongplanet. :3

Good night guys.