Debate: Free-Market Police: Better or Worse?
Side: Much, much better...

...I count at least three civil wars in Somalia. The one which formed to take Barre out. The one that formed in the power vacuum that occurred. The one between the UN transitional government and the Islamists.Then your previous comment about the "two decades of civil war" in relation to Somalia's statelessness was wrong. Very wrong... I still have no idea where you got that number from. I guess you just pulled that argument right out of your ass.The most violent years in Somalia were the years following 1991 when the United Nations was physically present, attempting to impose a central government. When the United Nations withdrew in 1995, the expectation of a future central government began to recede, and things began to stabilize. But the United Nations continued it efforts to re-establish a government through a series of some sixteen failed "peace conferences." In 2000 it set up a straw government, the Transitional National Government (TNG). However, not only did the northern Somali clans not recognize the TNG, it was unable to control its intended capital city of Mogadishu.Today a combined "peace-keeping mission" of United States–backed troops from Ethiopia, Somalia's traditional enemy, and Uganda under the aegis of the African Union is in Mogadishu attempting to prop up the TNG and secure its control over the rest of Somalia.The violence following the Barre regime's collapse came from already existing states trying to establish power, not from the Somali's themselves trying to rule each other.More non sequitur brought to you by a simple mind. The point is, you don't fear for your life every day because gangs with machetes aren't busting down doors in your village.How the hell is this a non-sequitur? YOU brought up the phrase "death-squad", I merely showed you how the phrase is best applied to states. Also, this is the first time you've called "non-sequitur" on me, so how exactly is this "more"? It seems you'd type pretty much anything so long as it sounds like it supports you. =/Sure, there's no gang busting down my door, unless I happen to own the wrong kind of vegetation or if I try to opt-out of state services. So, I suppose I'm safe so long as no gang finds reason to convince themselves that they have reason to invade my home... yeah that sure is a rock solid argument for the state. =/An existing state is accountable to the people within that nation. An invasive state is accountable to, obviously, the foreigners who make up its citizens.And a free market defense agency is accountable to its customers, the difference is the free market agency is subjected to competition, requiring it to constantly improve in order to get customers.Except that coercion did eventually conquer Ireland.How is this a counter argument? Once again you've just re-asserted what you've already been saying.I repeat:Ireland proves only that Christianity was an easy religion to spread hundreds of years ago. The fact that England spent hundreds upon hundreds of years failing to take over Ireland via military campaigns proves that coercion is not enough to conquer an anarchy.I said requests. This is an example of business corrupting the principles of trade.Yeah, corruption happening at request is more likely than corruption happening due to a payment. I hardly see how the method of request matters.Except they didn't. In over a century labour reform was essentially nil. History proves you wrong.In modern sweatshops they do not work towards fair practices, but fight them at every level. Do you know what the number one request from sweatshop workers is? For the shop to expand so that their relatives can also get jobs there. In an article about a Nike sweatshop in Vietnam, Johan Norberg wrote, "But when I talk to a young Vietnamese woman, Tsi-Chi, at the factory, it is not the wages she is most happy about. Sure, she makes five times more than she did, she earns more than her husband, and she can now afford to build an extension to her house. But the most important thing, she says, is that she doesn't have to work outdoors on a farm any more... Farming means 10 to 14 hours a day in the burning sun or the intensive rain... The most persistent demand Nike hears from the workers is for an expansion of the factories so that their relatives can be offered a job as well."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweatshop#Pro-sweatshop_arguments After the Child Labor Deterrence Act was introduced in the US, an estimated 50,000 children were dismissed from their garment industry jobs in Asia, leaving many to resort to jobs such as "stone-crushing, street hustling, and prostitution." UNICEF's 1997 State of the World's Children study found these alternative jobs "more hazardous and exploitative than garment production."Looks like your the one arguing against history. ;)Quit comparing the Industrial Revolution to feudalism.Yeah, I hear it can be a real bitch when someone brings up a point you can't counter. Maybe someday I'll know what that's like. ;)What else am I going to compare it to? Monarchism? Tribalism? Should I compare it to how chimps interact? Obviously I'm going to compare a market with sweatshops to what the market was like before it had sweatshops to see if it improved or not. How could this not make sense to you? Are you missing a chromosome or something? Rest of the rant of how crappy sweatshops areYeah, it's easy to point at working conditions back in the industrial revolution relative to contemporary standards and say it sucked, but relative to what preceded it, it was a step forward. I'm struggling to be more explicit, but this really is the simplest way to explain it. If you just don't understand how something can be better than what preceded it yet still have room for improvement, then you've got bigger problems on your hands than this debate against me.Do you wish to live as a cotton-picking slave? You never experienced it first-hand. Maybe it's all sunshine and lollypops.If it was a chieftain, or council, they would have ignored the plight of the lower class because the nobility would have their ear.But of course, when the unsettling facts stare you in the face, they're just sob stories. Thank god you're part of an unenlightened minority, because the rest of us who learn from history would rather not go through this again.What facts? This was ONE story that may not even have been true. There were no statistics, there was nothing to go on other than your word and I already know you're not above being manipulative.Which monopolies extend using their wealth and clout. That's why IP has an ownership duration of 75 years after the owner's death. The wealthy have a louder voice than the rest of us. This never changes.Yeah, so the only way to solve this is to remove the firm that allows the wealthy this power.What's this now? You know better than all the factory owners and robber barons spanning almost two centuries?No, that would be you. I just happen to know the same thing that these factory workers and "robber barons" knew, that unhappy workers are sluggish, shabby and more prone to killing themselves. Why do I even have to defend this point? Is it not obvious that unhappy persons don't work as efficiently as happy persons and that the depressed are more likely to kill themselves? What don't you get about high turnover and sweatshops? The labour supply always exists. Each job station is cramped and the workers are treated like units, not allowed to have individuality, with rules that punish any form of independent thought. Pay may be docked, beatings issued, because it is an uncomfortable workplace, with long hours, and the workers outnumber you. You are exploiting people and there is always the chance that they might retaliate. Hence you keep them in line with fear.If they are injured you replace them. If they die, big deal. They are replaceable. Your primary concern is extracting work out of them and keeping them submissive works.Don't you see how this makes no sense? These persons are already working for you, they're doing the job. What reason is there to needlessly beat them? As you've said, the supply for these workers is high. Why the hell would you sooner beat your workers when you can easily fire them and hire a worker that actually wants that job? Back in the industrial revolution there was a "window tax". this tax made it so fewer windows where placed around sweat shops. This made them needlessly dark and dreary. The owners would have liked to add more windows, it would make the workers more cheery and improve productivity, but the tax...There's just no reason to beat these workers. You're argument would make more sense if we were talking about doctors or something. There are far fewer doctors, so most firms couldn't afford loosing them. This type of situation it would make more sense to beat your workers, but when the supply is so high, it would be far more cots effective to just higher a better worker.The quality of life improved, then took a major hit in the Industrial Revolution, then improved again once regulations were enforced.What the hell are you talking about? Once again you're just pulling arguments right out of your ass. Real income per person doubled between 1760 and 1860. Therefore, the share of income going to the lowest 65 percent of the population would have had to fall by half for them to be worse off after all that growth. It didn’t. In 1760 the lowest 65 percent received about 29 percent of total income in Britain; in 1860 they got about 25 percent. So the lowest 65 percent were substantially better off. Their average real income had increased by over 70 percent.Never had the British been better off prior to the industrial revolution. The Industrial Revolution happened in the mid-1700s. So it would make sense that the wealthy had parliament pass laws to suppress their workers.The wealthy have a louder voice.Which is exactly why the state should be abolished. You can't lobby for state control over the market when there is no state.They are making a profit at the expense of damaging the environment around them that they own. Tragedy of the commons.No, avesk. Come on. =/I know you know this point is wrong. You're insulting both of our intelligences by continuing to defend it.If a factory farmer is farming beyond his factories means then he is damaging his own farm, not everyone else's. So this example is by definition not an example of barriers to entry. Factory farms are private property, they aren't public. =/Besides, the factory farm is this farmers source of revenue. If he can't upkeep it then he goes out of business and a more competent farmer steps in.Stupidity maybe? It doesn't matter if it's a state, or clan, or tribal council. Wealthy people buy favours from political entities.A "chieftain" with no market influence cannot sell market regulations. Your statement is as stupid as saying you can get a tree to produce more wood by offering it money. You could buy market favours from a Tuath chieftain in the same way you can buy market favours from the president of a local book club. =/