>We want money to move around, rather than sit in someone's safe
It's just paper. What's wrong with it sitting in someone's safe? We certainly don't want actual productive capital assets to be idle, but dollar bills don't produce anything. If they're sitting in a safe, the value of the ones that aren't in the safe goes up slightly.
I'm not sure quite what they meant, but that doesn't sound quite right to me either.
If the currency is stagnant or close to stagnant, the incentive to invest is that you end up with more wealth overall.
I'm not sure it's possible for deflation to be both predictable and higher than the market rate of return, because people today would immediately speculate and bid up the price of the currency to reflect its future expected value.
Of course inflation is an added incentive to invest money, or at least to store your wealth in assets other than money.
>It's probably because of the Age of Enlightenment in the west that did a thorough self evaluation over a few centuries.
I'm not sure what a "thorough self evaluation" would actually mean. I don't think that's even remotely feasible, given the immense scope of the subject matter. What has happened is that certain elements within western civilization have focused their efforts on criticizing western civilization, some in good faith and some not, and the rest of western civilization has allowed them to do so. That is the part that is rare, just like suicide, and for the same reason.
>You can obviously avoid marriage in the first place, in order to maximize services or avoid taxes.
No, you really can't. Do you seriously think the state is going to pay out more benefits to parents solely because they haven't signed a marriage certificate?
You _can_ absolutely qualify for more benefits if the other parent is unable or unwilling to contribute financially and the state is unable to coerce them to do so. But the state goes after the other parent first.
Part of the reason these programs are so harmful is that they provide incentives for the father to stay away from the children. Staying around to raise the children makes it a lot easier for the state to A) find him and B) make the case that he's the father or has taken on a fatherly role and is therefore responsible for paying for them.
Is this sarcasm, or are you suggesting that the same institution which set up these perverse rules has done such a great job that it should be given control over the funding of health care for 99% of the population?
>but I don't pretend to know or understand their full argument of why it should be regulated
One reason might be that they believe that having a culture which is hedonistic toward sex is harmful for society, and they believe that acceptance of homosexual behavior necessarily leads to having such a culture.
>presumably Stalinists?
That is definitely not a reasonable assumption to make.
>but if you're not religious and don't believe in utilitarianism, what exactly is the goal for your society?
It is perfectly possible to be utilitarian, non-religious, and opposed to the acceptance of homosexuality. All it takes is a belief that acceptance of homosexuality is on the whole and over time more harmful for people than intolerance of homosexuality.
>There's not really a way to counter this mentality by people like us because their worldview is so entirely alien to us
As you hint at up above, there are non-religious people who believe regulating sexual behavior is important for society. Do you have a way to counter that idea when it's based on a secular worldview which is not so alien to yours?
>totally legal to be a murderer or thief as long as you don't behave that way.
You must know this doesn't make any sense. Murderer and thief are words that describe people who actually murder or steal, not people who just have a desire to murder or steal. Gay describes who you are attracted to.
What I'm asking is more like, if the government microphone in your potted plant hears you coming out as gay to your friends, would that be grounds for criminal punishment?
Laws against inherent characteristics seem to me at least to be worse than laws which ban behavior. Conflating the two in order to make some particular law sound worse seems sort of dishonest to me.
>The foundations of libertarianism is a belief that individual rights and human rights are supreme.
Trust me, I don't need a lecture on the foundations of libertarianism. I've read enough Rothbard and company to get a pretty good feel for it.
>I don't believe a majority, or a democratically elected sovereign, has the right to curtail the freedoms and rights of individuals. That's what being discussed here.
I know what you believe.
>A "moral" system that deprives people of human rights, is amoral, and not worthy of honor or respect.
It's up to you to decide what you think is worthy of honor and respect, and up to me to make the choice for myself.
>By your moral framework, the German people, who elected Hitler into power, had every right in the world, to murder and slaughter millions of Jews, Roma, Slavs/Poles, and others. It was justified by the Nazi moral framework.
Hitler may have had the power to do those things. I'm not sure where you think I suggested he had a moral right to do them.
>This is why moral relativism is a bane, and a curse, and the source of many evils.
I agree with you that moral relativism is a bad ideology for a society to be founded up, in terms of achieving stable, wealthy, and peaceful societies. That said, it is a question of fact whether there is actually some absolute objective morality, and as far as I can tell, one does not exist.
>With regards to immigration, you have no right to demand the loyalty of others towards you or anyone else
I'm not sure why you're still telling me what I have the right to do or what I don't have the right to do. I know what your preferred moral system says I have a right to do. As it happens, I don't demand loyalty of people, I'd just rather that the people around me be loyal to me, and it's quite clear that certain human beings are more likely to be loyal to me than others are, and that there are policies that can discriminate on that characteristic and so achieve the result I desire.
>Visa restrictions are similar to banning interracial marriage.
I'm not sure why you're still listing things you think I will think are horrible in order to get me to agree with you. As I said, even if I sympathize with you on some point, it doesn't make your system universal.
>that I give zero fucks about your self-interest, as long as you pursue your self-interest in a manner that respects the rights of others.
I'm not sure why you would bother to write something like this. You do give zero fucks about my self-interest when I pursue it in a manner that doesn't respect what you think are the rights of others, and it's clear that's what we're talking about here.
>You're basically saying, I will continue to violate the rights of others, enslave others, oppress others -- until someone more powerful stops me.
I said that as a matter of fact that is what certain people did.
>In other words, your moral framework can be summed up in three words: might is right.
Might determines what happens is reality. I acknowledge and embrace that reality. You seem to want to yell your head off at anyone that won't absolutely accept your preferred moral system, as though that will get you what you want. I assure you, it will not.
>Well, I don't believe in the Nazi-Darwinian crap.
What does that even mean?
>What do I do?
My recommendation would be to convince other people that it's not in their interest to support slavery, and do what you can to change reality so that it's not in their interest to support slavery. Don't expect making people go against their interests by telling them they're horrible to be an effective or sustainable solution. If you convince them you're right about how horrible they are, and they go against their own interests, then what you've just done is harm the material interests of people that are predisposed toward listening to moral arguments, and effectively selected against trait.
>If you can't do that, I am justified in using violence against you, in self-defence, as I try to defend myself and others against the violence you try/wish to inflict upon me and others.
I think that's probably a bad idea, and not just because you'd lose the fight. The people you're fighting to allow into this country are not very likely to be sympathetic to your moral arguments, or even to your well-being.