Libertarians and licensing
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March 25th, 2013 at 4:12 pm
I dunno, I haven’t seen a lot of “affinity for licensing” among libertarians in that context.
More of it is “I don’t CARE about that licensing, so sure, let it get expanded”.
I’ve seen far, far more “get the State out of marriage entirely” (my own position as well) than “yes, we REALLY NEED marriage licenses, but let’s expand them to gays too”.
March 25th, 2013 at 8:55 pm
The affinity isn’t for licensing, it’s for equality before the law. There isn’t a single libertarian that wouldn’t like to get the government out of the marriage licensing business entirely, but in the meantime they’d like it to at the very least treat all consenting adults equally.
March 25th, 2013 at 9:34 pm
Uncle, thanks for posting!
Rob, as I quote in a few of the posts on this topic, if the libertarians I am talking about were the way you claim, they would be for equality in marriage, not just tacking on gay people so they can get government goodies. If the “debate” were about equality before the law, then it would be about everybody, not just gay people.
Do they ever include traditional Mormons, Muslims, or communal marriage? No, of course not. It is all about giving a really loud group government goodies and to Hell with the ones who are not that loud about it. Don’t believe me? Go read their articles and their responses.
Some of the libertarian advocates fall on the rhetoric you state, yet they are not out there rattling the bars for an end to any government handout, at all. One even responded that it will be easier to end the subsidies after more people are eligible for subsidies! Now when does that ever work?
Want marriage equality? End the licenses, then anybody can be married. Anything else is just a load of BS.
March 25th, 2013 at 9:44 pm
Austerian: have you ever heard of targeted messaging? I have read their articles; as a libertarian myself, I spend a great deal of time on libertarian websites. The classic problem of libertarianism is how to push for greater freedoms without turning off people whose minds have not quite yet opened up. As SayUncle puts it when discussing gun rights, you don’t want to scare white people.
This is incrementalism. It sucks, but it’s the only thing that has a track record of working. Further, by slowly opening up marriage for all consenting adults, you undermine the very reason marriage licensing was put in place in the first place – i.e., to keep gays and mixed race couples and polygamists from marrying. Eventually, people will see it as unneeded, making it much more likely to go away.
The idea behind that is that it will overload the system, which will collapse under its own weight. I’m skeptical of that position as well, but it has some merit. The financial problems in Europe will show about well that works within the nest 10 years or so, I’d wager.
March 25th, 2013 at 9:45 pm
*sorry, that should be Austrian.
March 26th, 2013 at 9:24 am
Rob, marketing tricks to expand government for freedom is ridiculous. No system is going to collapse when another fraction of the 3% is eligible for Social Security Survivor Benefits, or any of the other goodies this “debate” is really about.
If you want to expand marriage licensing so bad, get rid of the unearned benefits that come with marriage first.
March 26th, 2013 at 11:50 am
1138 reasons why government should be out of the marriage business: http://austriananarchy.blogspot.com/2013/03/1138-reasons-why-government-should-get.html Plus some LGBT community love for me.
March 26th, 2013 at 12:30 pm
>There isn’t a single libertarian that wouldn’t like to get the government out of the marriage licensing business entirely, but in the meantime they’d like it to at the very least treat all consenting adults equally.
Fuck-em. Time to shake up the system. There isn’t a single talking head asking why state-issued marriage licenses exist, are constitutional, or solve a real need beyond perpetuating the state’s control over people.
By weakly supporting gay marriage, you are enabling the bureaucratic machine to continue.
Furthermore, by getting the state out of the marriage biz entirely, you provide an “out” for politicians who have in the past strongly supported so-called “traditional” (i.e. non-polygamy) marriage and marriage laws.
March 26th, 2013 at 7:26 pm
Right on Standard!
On this topic, I got through to the Hallerin Hill show and chatted with him a bit about it. Caller after me wanted to “fix” the problem by renaming marriage.
http://austriananarchy.blogspot.com/2013/03/my-call-to-hallerin-hills-show-about.html