"Consent" is the favorite weasel-word of market-worshippers. Pray tell, in what sense do I "consent" to turn over a large share of my income just to have a roof over my head and to put distance between my home and criminals? Consent in a bargain between vastly unequal parties (in this case, an ordinary citizen vs. a market of wealthy people peddling almost exactly the same raw deal via emergent, silent price-fixing) is not consent at all.
As for "legitimacy" - what makes your landlord the legitimate owner of his property? Fine, he paid for it. And the person he paid? Go back just a couple generations and you will find a corpse. And, not infrequently, a genocide.
The legitimacy of a political system is always a collective hallucination. This is not a moral judgment. Collective hallucinations make for fine Nash equilibria and can benefit the people involved. But sometimes they do not.
> what makes your landlord the legitimate owner of his property? .... Go back just a couple generations and you will find a corpse.
You touched off this subthread by arguing that
> Soviet dairy farms once belonged to the Soviet people [who] were not adequately compensated for their loss.
You find corpses in the past of the Soviet people's dairy farms as well. Why, then, is their ownership "legitimate" such that they should be "adequately compensated"?
So, nobody's got a valid claim. How come one guy who didn't build the farm can pay another guy who didn't build the farm and suddenly own it. Neither of them have any more claim to it than anyone else.
If you think about it you can see why private ownership of resources is ridiculous. Unless you bought my share from me, fairly, why should I recognize your ownership claim?
The only answer, of course, is the non-libertarian one: force. If you pay the biggest guy around for something he'll beat up anyone who wants a share of the payment and legitimize your claim because to prevent a run on his now-valuable right to sell everything, he has to crack down on theft.
Under the previous guy's reasoning, that if you go back in time far enough "you'll find a corpse" and that this makes the property claim illegitimate, this is true. It's not reasoning I agree with, but I thought it was worth pointing out that if one accepts his reasoning, it contradicts his prior point that the Soviet people deserved compensation.
> If you think about it you can see why private ownership of resources is ridiculous.
I've thought about it and I think private ownership is perfectly reasonable in most cases.
It's true that in the past, faction A took land or materials from faction B, who took them from faction C, and it's turtles all the way down. But within the context of faction A, I am the legitimate owner of certain items, and you are the legitimate owner of certain items, many of which we either created ourselves or received in exchange for other things we created. Since we have to start somewhere, "I am the present owner, and I paid for this in a legally binding manner" is as good a starting point as any. Trying to account for whether my ancestors paid for your share, or even how many shares we're entitled to based on the size of our family trees, is a waste of time.
it contradicts his prior point that the Soviet people deserved compensation.
My point was that a better concept of legitimacy would define it as flowing out of how you use the property, rather than how you came to own it. The notion of land as a resource which belongs collectively to all of mankind is not a new one, and more than one internally-consistent philosophical system includes it.
> a better concept of legitimacy would define it as flowing out of how you use the property
Why, then, do you argue that the Soviet people's loss of the property was not adequately compensated? If legitimacy is based on usage rather than how ownership occurred, why do you complain about how ownership came about? The statement that privatization is theft is a direct comment on the process of ownership transition!
One can certainly make an internally consistent philosophical system based on public or communal ownership. I just don't think you've presented one.
> But within the context of faction A, I am the legitimate owner of certain items
Yes, and within the context of A' I'm also the owner of your stuff. I see no reason except your force of arms for staying in context A, especially after how you legitimized the theft from B and C.
> Since we have to start somewhere, "I am the present owner, and I paid for this in a legally binding manner" is as good a starting point as any
We already did start somewhere, this is umpteen thefts later. I see no reason to stop before umpteen plus one.
> Trying to account for whether my ancestors paid for your share, or even how many shares we're entitled to based on the size of our family trees, is a waste of time.
Exactly, and that's why private ownership of limited resources is ridiculous. If you own that land it's by depriving someone else, if you rent it from the collective your rent compensates others for the lost opportunity cost.
All ownership comes down to force of arms. When picking someone to legitimize your claims of possession instead of picking a strongman, pick everyone.
> within the context of A' I'm also the owner of your stuff.
But I don't live in context A'. I live in context A (which I was born into). If you want to transition to A', you're going to need force of arms sufficient to overcome those of us who'll shoot back in defense of A. Good luck with that.
> this is umpteen thefts later. I see no reason to stop
Because theft is bad. I didn't participate in any of the umpteen previous thefts. I can't untangle them or reverse them, but I see no reason to add to the mess.
> if you rent it from the collective
If I use any "rivalrous" good, my use deprives someone else. Whether it's land or food, if I'm using it you're not. If that's your criteria for determining that something belongs to the collective, then I can never acquire the means by which to pay rent to the collective. Even my labor is rivalrous and therefore falls under the same objection -- if I choose to use it for one purpose, I deprive you of the ability to use my labor for another purpose. It seems to me that "use deprives someone else" is a poor choice counterargument to private ownership.
> When picking someone to legitimize your claims of possession ... pick everyone
You mean everyone you didn't kill with force of arms when trying to transition to A', right?
Why not actually include a true "everyone", by allowing people to voluntarily live under whatever system they choose? If you want to be a collectivist, go find or start a collective and donate all your stuff to it, and join with others who voluntarily agree to it. It can be done without using force of arms offensively. Whatever force of arms was used to steal in the past, leave that in the past.
> I didn't participate in any of the umpteen previous thefts.
Except to buy the stolen goods, thus making the thefts profitable. And to legitimize the thieves.
> I can't untangle them or reverse them, but I see no reason to add to the mess.
Strange, I see the TV as a reason to "add to the mess". My TV to be.
> If you want to transition to A', you're going to need force of arms sufficient to overcome those of us who'll shoot back in defense of A. Good luck with that.
Ahhh yes, legitimize the situation with force. That'll convince me of your rights.
> You mean everyone you didn't kill with force of arms when trying to transition to A', right?
I see. I'd be a dirty thief for trying to get me a piece of that stolen loot and you'd be heroic for defending it against me.
You'd shoot B and C too if they showed up and wanted their stuff back.
> If I use any "rivalrous" good, my use deprives someone else. [...] Even my labor is rivalrous and therefore falls under the same objection -- if I choose to use it for one purpose, I deprive you of the ability to use my labor for another purpose.
It could be seen that way. That's why we shoot slavers. They're insidious and dangerous.
> Whether it's land or food, if I'm using it you're not. If that's your criteria for determining that something belongs to the collective, then I can never acquire the means by which to pay rent to the collective.
No, you could use your labor. Or, if you were willing to farm the land (for instance) you could share a portion of the results.
If you picked an uncontested piece of land the 'rent' could be pretty low, just enough to ensure it could be cleaned up after you left.
> Why not actually include a true "everyone", by allowing people to voluntarily live under whatever system they choose?
The biggest factor in their decision would be if they owned a lot of resources from previous thefts. Of course they'd never be willing to give up their loot.
> It can be done without using force of arms offensively.
But why should it? I could work my whole life (in your salt mine) to afford a piece of what you lucked into, or I could "luck into it" myself...
> If you want to be a collectivist, go find or start a collective and donate all your stuff to it [...]
Or, I could donate all your stuff to it.
> Whatever force of arms was used to steal in the past, leave that in the past.
Says the guy left holding the TV...
You can't come up with anything that justifies the current distribution of stuff without justifying how we got here, and that justifies someone else coming and doing to you what you (collectively) did to others. This is how it is but it's not somehow 'right' despite having been grandfathered in.
> You can't come up with anything that justifies the current distribution of stuff
Nor do I need to.
All I need to do is justify the position that you shouldn't do more violence and engage in more theft against whatever faction I was born into just because you decided your faction has a claim (either past or future) on our stuff.
You can't change the past, regardless of how "right" or "wrong" you think it was. It doesn't matter if what people did in the past was justified; it's the past, and they're dead and gone, so leave it be. Choose to live at peace in the present.
> I see. I'd be a dirty thief for trying to get me a piece of that stolen loot and you'd be heroic for defending it against me.
You'd be a violent asshole for trying to shoot me and my family for our stuff, and I'd be heroic for protecting my family from a violent asshole. The fact that you'd also be a thief is secondary. The fact that you think your thievery is justified by your philosophy is irrelevant.
If you want to persuade me to give up my stuff voluntarily, I have no problem with that. If B and C show up and want their stuff back and simply present a compelling argument, that's great. If you or B or C want to initiate force against me, that's where I have a problem.
> If you or B or C want to initiate force against me, that's where I have a problem.
And of course, taking back their TV would be force.
> You'd be a violent asshole for trying to shoot me and my family for our stuff, and I'd be heroic for protecting my family from a violent asshole.
Exactly. Which is why I'd wait for you to leave your house for the day and break in, change the locks, and wait for you to use force on me, making me heroic.
> Choose to live at peace in the present.
I choose to live at peace in the next present. This one is all camped out.
> All I need to do is justify the position that you shouldn't do more violence and engage in more theft against whatever faction I was born into
It doesn't matter what faction you were born into, if you buy a TV that was stolen - even if before you were born, you're a thief.
You're hiding behind the defense that violence is bad (unwarranted violence is...) and as such, because taking TVs involves violence, that the TV must stay with you. That the violence in question would be directed at those enjoying already violently stolen property lessens the impact of the second round of violence, in the eyes of the observers. After it happened you'd be B, and history. Nobody would care.
> The fact that you think your thievery is justified by your philosophy is irrelevant.
>> You can't come up with anything that justifies the current distribution of stuff
> Nor do I need to.
If you want to enjoy the property with a good conscience, you do.
Without the secondary market in stolen TVs you represent there wouldn't have been a profit in stealing the TV originally.
Your attitude would seem less self-serving if there wasn't an almost certainty that your government is complicit in the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, at least at level where you or I would be an accomplice under law, despite these wars being fairly obviously just a resource grab, not security related as they were originally justified. (And if not these injustices, then countless others.)
In other words, the mechanisms of your day-to-day life are busily creating more Bs and Cs all the time. And yet you have the arrogance to dictate that you're the end of the line. If your definition of ownership involved who could do the most good with a resource there would be an measure with which to determine your rights, but if you simply measure ownership as possession, if I take things away from you I own them as truly as you do. I was merely pre-defending myself (A') against the thieves of A.
As you have been unable to suggest any mechanism for ownership that doesn't come down to opposing violence, and your imagined rights as a non-combatant to have the violence happen to others, I'm going to say again that you've failed to make the case for private ownership of resources.
Your conscience says that property ownership makes one complicit in all the thefts and violence that came before; mine does not. Seeing as you have no problem threatening further theft and violence, it seems "a good conscience" is out of reach for you, but I'm doing just fine.
> if you simply measure ownership as possession
I do not. I measure ownership through the legal mechanisms under which I reside; "possession" hardly plays into it. I consider it appropriate to transfer ownership through those mechanisms, and not appropriate to worry about whatever violence may have happened prior to the establishment of those mechanisms generations ago. I also consider it appropriate to use the mechanisms provided by that legal system against those who attempt to illegally take possession of others' property; breaking in to my house and changing the locks makes you subject to arrest within this legal context.
Of course, as I said before, you can try to create your own context of communal ownership through voluntary donation and persuasive means. Or you can try to change that legal context through force of arms, and deal with my side shooting back at your band of violent assholes.
> you've failed to make the case for private ownership of resources.
I'm not interested in making the case for private ownership of resources. I'm just making the case that I'm OK with the context I live in (and I'm OK with you voluntarily living in some other context), and that you'll probably get shot if you try to violently overthrow my society.
> Seeing as you have no problem threatening further theft and violence, it seems "a good conscience" is out of reach for you
Not at all. I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of standing there holding a blood-covered TV arguing that this is exactly where the violence needs to stop.
And yet you're not actually concerned at all about ongoing thefts that enrich your context, just that which would deprive it.
> I measure ownership through the legal mechanisms under which I reside; "possession" hardly plays into it.
You do not. Those laws make knowing possession of stolen property a crime, regardless of how many steps it's been laundered through.
But yes, the government itself ignores that. You should consider what it says about the illegitimacy of a government that thinks it can bless theft.
> I consider it appropriate to transfer ownership through those mechanisms, and not appropriate to worry about whatever violence may have happened prior to the establishment of those mechanisms generations ago.
Of course not, the law says you don't have to. Don't worry, The laws in A' would say the same things.
> Or you can try to change that legal context through force of arms, and deal with my side shooting back at your band of violent assholes.
If you saw someone carrying a blood-covered obviously stolen TV you'd try to (even if only indirectly by calling the police) violently (if necessary) change his context. Why the hypocritical attitude when it comes to the idea of someone correcting your context?
> Your conscience says that property ownership makes one complicit in all the thefts and violence that came before; mine does not.
No. If that were true you wouldn't justify the theft inherent in your situation with the circular logic of the law of the latest conqueror.
As for "legitimacy" - what makes your landlord the legitimate owner of his property? Fine, he paid for it. And the person he paid? Go back just a couple generations and you will find a corpse. And, not infrequently, a genocide.
The legitimacy of a political system is always a collective hallucination. This is not a moral judgment. Collective hallucinations make for fine Nash equilibria and can benefit the people involved. But sometimes they do not.