From: zstewart@nyx.cs.du.edu (Zhahai Stewart)
Subject: Re: If you haven't sent your checks to no-on-hate yet, do it!
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Date: Sun, 27 Sep 92 17:40:25 GMT

In article <1992Sep25.173122.15439@spdcc.com> rdonahue@spdcc.com (Bob Donahue) writes:
>	Libertarianism *is* anti-equality.  Politics at a 4-year-old
>level.

Bumper Sticker: "Libertarianism: designer politics for the Me Generation"

More seriously, I am no expert on Libertarian theory (despite some reading and
a good deal of discussion), but I have run into a large number of self     
identified Libertarians on computer networks, and there does appear to be some
similarity of psychological profile, as best I can (fallibly) sense it.
I'm not sure how this maps to what age, but Libertarians *have* generally 
progressed beyond the "gimme gimme" level of development.  Some (many?) do
seem stuck at the next level ("I won't steal your toys if you won't steal mine")
with sometimes an element of "we can both play together while we both want to".

I don't mean to entirely knock this; it is a stage of emotional/social   
development which eludes some members of our society.  But long experience
leads me to posit that any argument which is built on any further level of
social development than the above just goes over most Libertarian's heads,
emotionally/intuitively (not intellectually, of course; they can be quite
intelligent at times).  It is almost impossible not to sound patronizing,
and I apologise for that, but the above is my honest and well pondered
experience with most Libertarians.  The few people I've met who have more
or less Libertarian intellectual sympathies without the above described
emotional level, have not tended to get along well with "real" Libertarians.
These people are gems by the way; sometimes they can argue points that sound
vaguely Libertarian, but in a non-simplistic fashion; such intelligent and
emotionally/socially "literate" discussion can be quite exciting, challenging
one's assumptions.  In turn, they find someone like me much more exciting
to discuss with, than are most Libertarians, from what they tell me.

I think it must be somewhat hard to be intellectually aligned (more or less)
with a political group whose social/emotional development you find lacking.
I have occassionally found this within groups I have worked with, in my
political work, but it's generally not too bad.

Anyway, to get back to the main thrust of this: Libertarians can sometimes be
good allies in regard to issues such as discussed here (queer civil rights,
say), as long as they can identify more with the humans being discriminated
against, than with the ones doing the discrimination.  Intellectual arguments
only slightly influence this.  Unfortunately, Libertarians typically have a
very easy time identifying with "the boss who wants complete control over
their workplace, with zero outside interference"; this means that the boss
can hire, fire, harass, or whatever, based only d*mn well anything they feel
like, including skin color, sexual orientation, politics, gender, religion,
eye color, or astrological sign.  A touching and reverent faith in "the
marketplace" can reconcile this approach with the "intuitive" sense that maybe
such discrimination would'nt be so nice to the person on the receiving end;
this just requires that one believe that the market will do the optimim job
of fixing the disparity (not perfect, by the way, just the best possible).
That is, there is a built in rationale ("the market") that justifies having
more identification with the boss than the employee, even tho both are humans
with needs for "liberty".

It would appear that relatively few folks "on the wrong end of the stick" tend
to have this confidence, and thus become Libertarians.  In my observation, most
L's tend to be folks to whom society has given a privileged and well rewarded
position, and who feel that without government their own position would be
even better.  They may talk about it not being a zero-sum game, and thus 
everyone doing better; but they don't really have to worry about this much,
as they feel that in either case (whether the poor get poorer or richer, say),
they personally will be richer, without personally stealling from anyone, and
this is enough.  Since those of us talented in computers tend to be much better
paid than folks with equivalent talents in poetry, music, cooking, child care,
landscaping, nursing, or fixing lawnmowers, ie: we tend to be on the "good end
of the stick", there is a natural tendency for a higher percentage of folks
to be attracted to Libertarianism.

These are my observations, and nothing more.  I think they are worth pondering
and reflection when a discriminated against group is discussing their issues
with Libertarians.  If it suits their self image more to identify with you,
they may help; if it suits them more to identify with those who have the power
to discriminate, you may lose them.  Intellectual arguments are secondary to
this dynamic.
   ~z~