The best course for libertarianism

== Pro Plan == His main strategy is infiltration. He offers some historical examples for consideration: KKK – The successes of this movement were not a result of mass awareness and participation. Poll taxes and literacy laws effectively excluded poor blacks and whites at local levels. The "grass roots" campaigning was essentially a coup by the minority ownership class. The movement was marked by exclusion and violence. This is not a good example of persuasion, infiltration, and political action. [1] Even if it were, there are also other fundamental reasons why this cannot be compared to libertarian activism. Any popularity of the KKK movement was based on special privilege and political inequality, something libertarians can never be a part of. We will never be able to buy votes with welfare. I don't think libertarians would have much luck persuading people dependent on welfare to end the welfare state. New Democratic Party – The metamorphosis of the American left into the party of welfare and government spending is similar to the KKK in its reliance on special privileges and handouts. It was not characterized by mass awareness and grass roots persuasion. Indeed, the common philosophy of previous generations had been to simply let the market sort itself out [2]. The ideological source of government intervention came from the government itself, not the masses [3]. Again, this is not a good example of persuade, infiltrate, vote. Pro continues with other examples of parties that have changed. My intention has never been to argue that all parties are perpetually stagnant, but rather to attribute their changes to factors other than mass awareness. Parties may change cosmetically to fit better with voter culture (see Pro's example of Christians), but actual policy has largely been influenced by different special interest groups, sourced in R1. ==Con Analysis== 2) A) Voters are Rationally Ignorant Pro tries to write this off as just a subjective statement about how dumb everyone is. My core claim is that even if people are brilliant, there is no incentive for them to adopt or search for a correct ideology because the chance it will actually make an impact is very low. If they spend hours becoming a master of political science, or just sit on the couch watching TV, everyone else is going to vote more or less the same way. B) Libertarian Persuasion is Impractical Pro thinks that the libertarian platform has good appeal. It may be true that people identify positively with property rights and self ownership, but the left and right have long established equally persuasive myths that require intelligence and rhetoric to answer. "What about the poor?" and "National defense" may as well be the demopublican party slogans. There is a large statist mythos (mostly centered on WWII and the New Deal) supporting these ideologies. We have no well known mythology... We can never win the rhetoric game. Libertarian appeals must be intellectual. In light of A), mass voter education is a practical impossibility. Regardless, in this sub point, I state that: "Even if a majority became convinced of some libertarian ideals, what then? The good intentions of a democratic majority were subverted with the flick of a wrist in this latest election [3]. We should expect this. Mass political action is not effective because the system is broken. See above." I went on to point out that even the founder of the Libertarian Party, who still runs for senate, thinks political action will never work. C) Libertarian Persuasion is Insufficient This sub point is simply reprinted: "Free markets are a public good. They benefit practically everyone, but their provision in a democracy must be collective and selfless. Even individuals who believe markets are the best way to organize society may still choose to vote in their own narrow self interest. For example, entrenched special interests benefit enormously from influencing politics and gaining special privileges. The groups who are "net tax consumers" will never join the free market movement. To do so would be against their class interest. For info, see libertarian class theory." 3) Re-open the frontier! A) Market Based Activism is More Libertarian Libertarians would never whine about a monopolistic corporation. They'd try to compete with it. Market mechanisms are fundamentally libertarian, while collective action and coercive policy making is not. The whole point of libertarianism is that you SHOULDN'T decide things by voting. B) Seasteading logistics Cost - $250/sqft is pretty close to the cost of many land developments as cited in R1. Even if the initial cost of seasteads is prohibitive for some types of investments, it may not be for others. See examples about selling unapproved/prescription drugs and utilizing immigrant workers. Once the initiative is spearheaded, the size of the industry will draw down costs through production of scale. Additionally, the speed at which seasteading takes off is dependent on how many people are involved with the movement. If the institute goes at its current pace, it will probably be 15 years before a fully operational seastead is successfully launched. In the meantime, they are pursuing incremental goals in order to prove that seasteading is a good idea in order to get more funding and more support [4]. Pro's critiques of the practicality seasteading aren't anything new. His arguments come from blogs of naysayers and people looking to laugh at the libertarian movement. Seasteaders already thought of all these problems and have answers [5]. I can't answer every "what if" pro can think up because there isn't enough space. The little nuts and bolts, like pirates, don't matter. If Seasteading is good in theory, the small things can be worked around. Pro's last point is that seasteads aren't even libertarian societies. Well, they are based off consent (no one can force you onto a seastead). They are also a peaceful use of private property. Sounds very libertarian to me. C) Seasteading Appeal and Sustainability Essentially, if we can make seasteading profitable, it will happen. We don't need to convert anyone to libertarianism because we don't need mass action. Seasteaders don't even have to be libertarian in the first place. Seasteading is intrinsically libertarian because it presupposes individual consent and property rights. D) Rendering Political Ideology Obsolete Seasteading does not actually require anyone to be libertarian, so we don't have to persuade people of the whole ideology. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org... [2] http://www.firstprinciplesjournal.com... [3] http://mises.org... [4] http://seasteading.org... [5] http://seasteading.org...