![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Well, really, I don't think we do, though I do have a friend who would ask "what's so big about freedom anyway?" I'm not sure if he was being Socratic or not.
But I've seen lots of libertarians say we do. I think mostly because those libertarians are rather dogmatic, to put it politely, and view less than 100% support as hatred, vs. the reality of liberals liking freedom but also liking children to get a fair chance in life, even if that means someone having to pay taxes.
Buuut... you know Patric Henry? Founding Father, famous orator, supposedly said "Give me liberty or give me death!"? Know anything else about him? What state or even region he was from? I didn't, until earlier tonight.
I might have heard he was from Virginia, but I didn't usefully know that; I might well have guessed New England. But he was Virginian. A Virginian tobacco planter and slaveowner. Owned several dozens of slaves, in fact. So much for that liberty, eh? To be fair, he did write letters that showed conflict about it, and viewing it as a lamentable evil... but one he couldn't see doing without, and he didn't free his slaves even in his will.
And there's Jefferson, who ended up with more slaves than he started with, and only freed his relatives. Which puts a lie to a conservative claim that he couldn't free his slaves, due to entailment due to debt... And as President, some years after those words about Life and Liberty, he withdrew John Adams's recognition of the ex-slave state of Haiti. Not just a personal weakness, but a systematic orientation toward the cause of slavery.
A while back I read _The Ancien Regime in Europe_, and there was a recurrent theme of centralizing kings being opposed on the grounds of 'liberty!'... that is, the liberties of the aristocracy, starting with not paying taxes.
The end point of all this is that while I'm not sure how big a consideration it really is, there's a fair historical case to be made that the people who *talk* the most about liberty are often the most active in oppressing others themselves. Slaveowners talk about liberty nearly as much as slaves do. Which can created some jaundiced cynicism and suspicion of those who shout about liberty today. It's not perfect, after all slaves do talk about liberty too, but still.
Modern libertarians aren't slaveowners or feudal aristocrats, of course. OTOH, they do often talk about how government distorts markets and causes corruption and rent-seeking... while loudly insisting that today's rich people can't be dispossessed of any of their wealth, despite the logical inference that much of it is ill-gotten gains via government-enable corruption and rent seeking! And they're equally comfortable with people owning tens of billions of dollars -- the lifetime earnings of 10,000 people -- while others go hungry. Not *happy*, they'll talk about charity and such, but no systematic changes. So yeah. It's not owning people outright, but it is shouting loudly about liberty while defending vast de facto class privilege coupled with human misery.
So if liberals don't seem impressed with libertarian arguments about freedom... that might be part of why. Especially when they often hear libertarians talking more about cutting taxes and preventing universal health care rather than about reforming municipal zoning and business restrictions. I.e. talking more about helping those already highly privileged than those more substantially suffering from ill-justified restrictions of freedom. I know some libertarians do talk about those, but you kind of have to go looking for them.
But I've seen lots of libertarians say we do. I think mostly because those libertarians are rather dogmatic, to put it politely, and view less than 100% support as hatred, vs. the reality of liberals liking freedom but also liking children to get a fair chance in life, even if that means someone having to pay taxes.
Buuut... you know Patric Henry? Founding Father, famous orator, supposedly said "Give me liberty or give me death!"? Know anything else about him? What state or even region he was from? I didn't, until earlier tonight.
I might have heard he was from Virginia, but I didn't usefully know that; I might well have guessed New England. But he was Virginian. A Virginian tobacco planter and slaveowner. Owned several dozens of slaves, in fact. So much for that liberty, eh? To be fair, he did write letters that showed conflict about it, and viewing it as a lamentable evil... but one he couldn't see doing without, and he didn't free his slaves even in his will.
And there's Jefferson, who ended up with more slaves than he started with, and only freed his relatives. Which puts a lie to a conservative claim that he couldn't free his slaves, due to entailment due to debt... And as President, some years after those words about Life and Liberty, he withdrew John Adams's recognition of the ex-slave state of Haiti. Not just a personal weakness, but a systematic orientation toward the cause of slavery.
A while back I read _The Ancien Regime in Europe_, and there was a recurrent theme of centralizing kings being opposed on the grounds of 'liberty!'... that is, the liberties of the aristocracy, starting with not paying taxes.
The end point of all this is that while I'm not sure how big a consideration it really is, there's a fair historical case to be made that the people who *talk* the most about liberty are often the most active in oppressing others themselves. Slaveowners talk about liberty nearly as much as slaves do. Which can created some jaundiced cynicism and suspicion of those who shout about liberty today. It's not perfect, after all slaves do talk about liberty too, but still.
Modern libertarians aren't slaveowners or feudal aristocrats, of course. OTOH, they do often talk about how government distorts markets and causes corruption and rent-seeking... while loudly insisting that today's rich people can't be dispossessed of any of their wealth, despite the logical inference that much of it is ill-gotten gains via government-enable corruption and rent seeking! And they're equally comfortable with people owning tens of billions of dollars -- the lifetime earnings of 10,000 people -- while others go hungry. Not *happy*, they'll talk about charity and such, but no systematic changes. So yeah. It's not owning people outright, but it is shouting loudly about liberty while defending vast de facto class privilege coupled with human misery.
So if liberals don't seem impressed with libertarian arguments about freedom... that might be part of why. Especially when they often hear libertarians talking more about cutting taxes and preventing universal health care rather than about reforming municipal zoning and business restrictions. I.e. talking more about helping those already highly privileged than those more substantially suffering from ill-justified restrictions of freedom. I know some libertarians do talk about those, but you kind of have to go looking for them.