Decades of being a Libertarian will inevitably help you develop a very thick skin due to the number of nonsensical assumptions you’ll hear about your ideas from the outside world. Like the aging hippie at the record store, we’ve heard everything, and we’ve learned to just grumble and roll our eyes when we hear stupid things.
We’re accused of being conspiracy theorists ax-grinding against the Illuminati and the lizard people who control world governments. We’re accused of being intolerant bigots, despite libertarianism being the only political philosophy that is incompatible with racism. We’re even accused of wanting to abolish public schools so that children can work in coal mines (well, this one is true, but you get the point).
The list goes on.
Volumes can be written about the misunderstandings and misconceptions of libertarianism, but today we're going to focus only on the top six myths that we feel should be dispelled with the appropriate contempt they deserve.
Myth #1 - Libertarians Want to Live Alone on An Island
Because Libertarians suspect that there are much better ways to fund vital public resources than excessive compulsory taxation that disproportionately benefits the ruling class and harms the middle and working class, we are seen as being against society completely. We want to live in isolated shacks in the middle of the woods or float out in the middle of international waters.
We are assumed to want to be our islands because libertarianism is seen as a sole individualist philosophy. While libertarians do believe that individual liberty should not be eroded by the collective will of the masses, our ideas are quite compatible with living in a large society with others.
Libertarianism is the only philosophy that values the individual's role within society. We as Libertarians mutually respect every individual’s autonomy and keep the individual's sovereignty in mind when considering projects that would critically affect the group. We would not use force against our neighbors to get what we want.
Building voluntary relationships and communities that mutually support one another is the apex of libertarian philosophy. It is completely contrary to living in total isolation.
While some Libertarians may want to live in more remote regions for their peace, having respect for your neighbors’ rights does not denote the will to be completely estranged from society. This is usually only suggested when all other arguments from our opponents have been exhausted.
In their minds, the only way to fund and manage society is by having centralized authority take half of everything you own. That is the only way to be fair and decent. The demanding work of building lasting relationships in a community is so foreign to them that they will resort to the anti-social behavior of rigid authoritarianism, and then ironically accuse libertarians of being cold and distant. If you resist needless and excessive taxation, then certainly you must want to live alone in an underground bunker.
Myth #2 - Libertarians Hate the Poor
Taxes help the poor, don’t they? Without taxation, the government would not be able to fund life-saving social programs that help the needy. Also, there would not be enough money left over to pay for all the wars, the police state, the mass invasion of privacy, militarism, central banks, the prison industrial complex, and the war on drugs.
In short, we need an overreaching, abusive, tyrannical, wasteful nanny state otherwise there is no other way to help the poor.
Now, because Libertarians are against such an institution having control over the critical mass of society’s financial independence, the only proper conclusion to draw is that we hate the poor.
What else could it be?
For those who need it spelled out for them, Libertarians do not hate the poor. We reject government waste. When politicians start talking about taking more from your paychecks so that they can help the poor, you should run away screaming, and run fast.
The help-the-poor justification that many politicians have utilized in the past several decades has resulted in the poor and middle class paying most of the taxes, while their communities suffer from being overregulated by the state.
Individuals can hate whatever they want, but libertarian philosophy ensures that every person gets the opportunity to thrive in life. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for ALL people.
Myth #3 - Libertarians Are Just Republicans Who Do Drugs
First, Libertarians are not Republicans, nor are they, democrats. Libertarians come from many different political beginnings, but the philosophy itself does not support either of the major political parties.
Second, the belief that libertarians are self-indulgent hedonists who just want the government out of their way so that they can do drugs and drink themselves into oblivion is also a misnomer.
Libertarianism is a philosophy that stresses the importance of individual responsibility. While we believe that one has the right to use drugs as one sees fit, we do not endorse the recklessness of drug and alcohol addiction. Addiction is not liberty; it is self-imposed slavery.
Just because we do not believe that the government has the authority to throw a person in a cage because they decided to experiment with drugs, does not mean we want anybody to fuck their life up on drugs.
Also, just because we do not believe that the government has the authority to abuse an individual for being a drug addict, does not mean that we do not want proper treatment readily available for addicts that are funded voluntarily by a supporting and loving community. The victims of drug addiction need compassion, not a police officer beating them senselessly (Looking at you Biden & Harris).
Myth #4 - Libertarians Support Slavery
One of the more obnoxious assumptions is that Libertarians want the total abolition of government so that we can bring back the “good old days of slavery.” Nothing could be further from the truth. Why would the libertarian philosophers of today want to eradicate the regulations that harm businesses to merely bring back the wretched, insidious scourge of slavery?
The reality is, even the great libertarian thinkers hundreds of years ago had economically and philosophically rejected the institution of slavery. Libertarians did not endorse slavery while it was socially and legally acceptable, so why would they start supporting it now on this side of the Civil War? It makes no sense.
Great libertarian philosophers like Adam Smith and Lysander Spooner had publicly denounced slavery on moral, ethical, and economic grounds far before slavery was outlawed in England and America. One more time for the people in the back, Libertarians rejected slavery while it was still legal in the west!
In the literature published, it was well and long established that slavery was and always will be the antithesis of libertarianism. Liberty is the opposite of slavery. The same cannot be said of socialism.
Myth #5 - Libertarians Are Bigots
Another myth the weasels like to regurgitate over and over is the delusion that Libertarians are bigoted against minorities and women. Our critics believe that only white men are attracted to the idea of freedom. Let that sink in. Those who accuse libertarians of being racist and sexist believe that the philosophy of liberty is only compatible with white men. Freedom, in their minds, is too risky and too dangerous for anybody else.
Libertarianism, on the contrary, is the only political philosophy that rejects racism and sexism on solid principled grounds. The firm principle of self-ownership is paramount in libertarianism. Every individual owns themselves and cannot be legitimately owned by another person. This includes a subject to the authority or any involuntary caste system. If you are a racist or sexist, then libertarianism is not for you.
Libertarians believe that all people are inherently free. Freedom cannot be a threat to the individual because that is the default by which they exist. The only danger that threatens the individual or groups of individuals is force and institutionalized force. Libertarians have a long and lasting history of opposing all laws that tamper with and diminish the freedom of the individual. Libertarians have also vehemently opposed all public and government discrimination as well as the CDC's covert racist medical trials committed against minorities.
The same cannot be said of other political philosophies that attempt to infantilize and ensnare the individual to keep them “safe” from freedom.
Myth #6 - Libertarians Are Sycophants for Big Business
It has been long assumed that since Libertarians are opposed to excessive business regulations we are somehow conspiring with big business. We just want those annoying regulations eliminated so rich people can dump waste into the rivers, pollute the air, and hurt as many employees as we want without consequence.
You would figure that since big business hates the government so much that some of them would contribute to the libertarian party. As far as I can tell, the biggest and most profitable companies made campaign contributions to, primarily, the democrat party, and secondarily to the republican party.
They must not be all that concerned with regulations being overthrown. So much for big business wanting the libertarians to have all the authority.
But what about Libertarians? Don’t they simp for the fat cats?
Libertarians tend to be very motivated people despite the contradictory impression that we are all drug-addled conspiracy theorists who vote republican and steep ourselves in hedonistic squalor. Yes, a lot of small business owners and entrepreneurs are libertarians or sympathetic to libertarian ideals.
Yet, that is because we want to solve problems for humanity, and we have a genuine passion for our crafts. We want to conduct business without hindrance from government regulations ironically written by mega-corporations to stifle competition. In business, labors of love often turn to successful endeavors. It is almost synonymous. However, despite the popularity of thinking that libertarians are sycophants for big business, entrepreneurs have a remarkable tendency to be at odds with big business.
We do not support cronyism, we do not support duopolies, and we do not support violent cartels who threaten free enterprise. We also do not support big pharmaceutical companies committing fraud, or the mainstream news media’s deliberate intentions to stratify the masses; a service that benefits the ruling class, not the people.
Libertarians prefer startups, entrepreneurship, and small business. We do not worship mega corporations who buy politicians nor do we wish to be corporate whores for the status quo.
Well, there you have it, folks, 6 myths about libertarians were properly and thoroughly debunked. If you would like to share some of the hilarious assumptions made about libertarians you've heard, go ahead and hit up the comments section.
