individual or the state.. who came first?

I think the main difference we have in our political discourse is a fundamental difference in the kind of government that we want. There are extremes.. some want full state control, others want full individual liberty. Most of us want something in the middle. But finding that middle ground is the hard part, or so it seems, because anyone who debates any particular point of the size & scope of government is automatically assigned to one of the extremes.. They are either an authoritarian statist, or a libertarian anarchist.

I definitely lean toward the individual freedom side.. most of my opposition to government is because of too much of it. The more the state expands & controls things, the more it takes our freedoms & responsibilities.

How do we determine if a particular issue is a good thing for our individual freedom, or is giving the state more control? For me, a simple way is to ask if this issue protects my freedom & individuality, or does it take it & give it to the state or someone else?

And here we encounter the seeds of government disaster and collapse -- the kind that wrecked ancient Rome and every other civilization that allowed a sociopolitical monster called the welfare state to exist.
Barry Goldwater

"Every step we take towards making the State our Caretaker of our lives, by that much we move toward making the State our Master."
Dwight D. Eisenhower

 

I'm pro individual liberties as long as it doesn't screw other people's individual liberties or general health (including healthcare and protection via armies and police).

After that IMO it should be fair game assuming some people don't screw other people too much. The classic you're free until your freedoms inhibit other people's freedoms or lifestyles (I'm capitalist, not a commie, I'm saying if the poor get TOO poor it's bad).

 

Me, I think that the individual is more important than the state. Also, I think that governments will be around in some form no matter what. So therefore, create a government by the people. Ensure the indivudal can do whatever he pleases without harming his neighbors.

 

Some people think they can crawl out from under their rock and just do whatever they want. I disagree.

If people are going to be crawling out from under their rocks there ought to be some sort of mutual agreement, some rules on things like behaviour so people can get together and do stuff, like have a society or something, without some jerks trying to threaten, intimidate, kill or maim everyone.

Some people call that government. I call it common sense.

 

The individual came first and then the state/elite took control of the people. That is exactly how it is to this very day and the liberty movement has always been against oppressive state/ruling class control.

Only now, the state/ruling class has convinced the confused masses that they are on their side. And get this..chuckle..they call themselves "liberals!!!!"

 

I think that humanity is more important than any individual human, but I also think that the responsibility that each individual has to humanity should be fulfilled in a manner of that individual's choosing.

I'm against the state becoming too intrusive into the lives of individuals, whether that's a corporate state or a democratic state. Given the choice, I prefer a democratic state, as I think it's much easier to keep a democratic state from being intrusive than a corporate state.

 

I object to the whole false dichotomy of this thread. Long before big government (the state) and the me-centered view of the world (individual rights) came the common human concepts of family, community and society. They used to be the glue that bound people and states together and some aspects still survive since they address basic human wants and needs.

Yet now we get individualists arguing for what they want at the expense of family, community and society, and we have statists mandating what the family, community and society should be and how it should behave. A plague on both your houses!

 

Some things are a compromise.. we pay taxes to support schools, police, & firemen. We give away some of our liberties with our money to get a service that is beneficial to all. We expect it to be well managed, though.. can't just give them blank checks. But these are local services, provide by local government. What do we expect from the federal government? What are its basic duties? I'll go back as i often do to the declaration of independence:

"That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."

It is the basic function of our government to secure our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We don't really need it to do much else, & that was the point of the founders of america. Get a simple, fair, modest government that does not try to exploit us & oppress us, but protects & defends us. Monarchies do not do this. Marxism & socialism do not extoll the liberties of the individual. Dictatorships & any other totalitarian states see the state as being supreme, & the individual as serving it. That is the basic difference between statism & individualism. If our government is promoting state centered programs, they are pursuing statism & not individual freedom.


My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.
Thomas Jefferson

"Socialism is inseparably interwoven with totalitarianism and the abject worship of the State."
Winston Churchill

 

The State can only exist when it has the individual to rule over. Without man, the state can not exist, as it has nobody to govern, tax, defend, and oppress

 

This is the classic Locke vs. Hobbes debate:

The social contract is an intellectual device intended to explain the appropriate relationship between individuals and their governments. Social contract arguments assert that individuals unite into political societies by a process of mutual consent, agreeing to abide by common rules and accept corresponding duties to protect themselves and one another from violence and other kinds of harm.

According to Thomas Hobbes, human life would be "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short" in the absence of political order and law. In its absence, we would live in a state of nature, where each person has unlimited natural freedoms, including the "right to all things" and thus the freedom to plunder, rape, and murder; there would be an endless "war of all against all".

John Locke's conception of the social contract differed from Hobbes' in several fundamental ways, retaining only the central notion that persons in a state of nature would willingly come together to form a state. Locke believed that individuals in a state of nature would be bound morally, by The Law of Nature, not to harm each other in their lives or possession, but without government to defend them against those seeking to injure or enslave them, people would have no security in their rights and would live in fear. Locke argued that individuals would agree to form a state that would provide a "neutral judge", acting to protect the lives, liberty, and property of those who lived within it.

Rousseau believed that liberty was possible only where there was direct rule by the people as a whole in lawmaking, where popular sovereignty was indivisible and inalienable. But he also maintained that the people often did not know their "real will," and that a proper society would not occur until a great leader ("the Legislator") arose to change the values and customs of the people, likely through the strategic use of religion.

 

Of course the individual came first.. the question is do we lean toward more state control at the expense of personal liberty, or do we champion liberty at the risk of the weak being oppressed?

It seems to me we have been on a statist course for the last 100 yrs or so. The us has been moving toward more & more state centered govt. Where is the balance? At what point do we stop the pendulum swing & go back to a more individual centered ideology? Or is it hopeless? Once the state gains power, they never give it back.

What statist policies can be turned around to promote individual liberties?

Here's my list of modest government duties:

1. Protect & defend our lives & liberties from enemies.
2. Secure the border & manage immigration.
3. Manage interstate commerce & regulations.
4. Manage international commerce & negotiate treaties.
5. Manage & provide a sound currency.

I believe a government that does this is enough. We don't need them to micro manage everything we do. We don't need them to tell us what food to eat, who to marry, what light bulbs to use, & to provide jobs & services for us for life.

I don't see this as being a merely intellectual exercise. The state has actual power over us, & we allow it. When do we tell the state, 'Enough!!'

"Whenever the legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience."
John Locke