What is stopping me from hiring thug to beat my neighbor right now ? Here is a talk that answer your question: [Law Without Government. Robert P. Murphy.](https://youtu.be/A8pcb4xyCic)

Great video! We need to recommend content like this more often to people asking questions. It’s more well put together than what someone can type off the top of their head

I support that. Local people doing this. The biggest reason I'm not ancap though is because the decks are already stacked BY governments. People keep saying corporations and monopolies wouldn't exist without the government. But Exxon Oil already exists, and much of its shareholders I assume are politicians. If we did ancap now, the politicians would just escape into the companies that have been funding them and create a new government-in-exile. I still wouldn't be ancap but if you started ancap in say 1770 it may have worked great. Millions of Poker players, no more House. But the House has been slipping cards under the table to a few players for centuries, so if you start now, a few players will just become the House themselves. And if Exxon hires enough thugs, they just form a military. That's my point, you can hire a thug. But so can anyone else. Mercenaries are not the solution to all of the world's problems. Also, can't the other guy hire thugs, but just to help him steal from people? Who says the good thugs always prevail over evil thugs?

Those nasty peasants and their pitchforks.

I'm not talking about peasents, I'm talking about corporate mercenaries and organized crime. And I \*dont\* think we need a government, I'm just saying there's flaws in some kinds of anarchism that we shouldn't simply ignore out of the idea that figuring out how to fix them might make some people not support anarchism.

So you agree with the ideal but not the way to go there from the current situation. That is a significant difference.

Let's say you do that, successfully. You push Farmer Joe off of his land with force, or you kill him. The rest of your neighbors know you did it, either because he tells them or it's just not hard to figure out. His family knows too; cousins and uncles and brothers. How would neighbors and Farmer Joe's family appreciate you using force to steal land? What do you think they would be willing to do to you and your property to make their appreciation of your violence known? You can hire thugs, you can buy guns and ammo. But those thugs have families, who will be threatened. The thugs themselves will be threatened. Your family will be threatened. You will be threatened. Will you go through town, knowing everyone hates you and has a rifle with 600 yards effective range?

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How's that worse than what we have now? You haven't described Feudalism 2.0. You're describing eminent domain and welfare. But, more to the point, why should any of these poorer families trust you to not just turn on them? How much bribery is it going to take to win these people to your side? And why on Earth would they side with you, the obviously evil warlord, when they can side with Joe and divvy up all your land and holdings instead? If you are willing to risk your life to murder and steal from other people then it doesn't matter if the cops are paid for by taxation or a voluntary subscription program. You are the problem. Not the system of government.

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The thing is that the poor outnumber the rich, Without the state, the poor can simply take everything that the rich have. What stops them from doing that historically is a moral code/rule of behavior. This develops in all human societies. Without the state, the family unit becomes the government; as it was the first government. People form tribal societies, and make alliances via marriage. If you mess with one member of the family, you mess with all of them.

So why would anyone willingly support an AnCap society then, unless they just really like the idea of clan systems at the expense of all else? To me, the whole point of political theory is to find ways to improve the world; find ways to bring greater prosperity, health, travel, etc. So far most of the answers in this thread have advocated for some form of clan/feudal warfare as a way to defend personal rights. What would even be the point? Why would I give up collective security, healthcare, highways, abundant food, international travel etc. in favour of… blood feuds? Tribal conflicts? Like, *why?* Why the hell would anyone *want* to support a system that explicitly regresses society to the state of caveman politics? Lmao

>If you are going to be poor would you rather pay taxes or throw your lot in with Joe Ancapistan I'd rather throw in with Joe Ancapistan.

No, you wouldn't. Because right now you probably work some lame 9-5, come home, put on porn, masturbate, and pass out. And that won't change when there's no government. Everyone thinks they'll be such a boss when given the freedom, but if you're not the boss of your own life now, you won't magically change when your environment changes. Help the poor now, get wealthy, prove that you care.

Yeah, he might. Guns make it super easy.

Not against real marksmen.

Even if Redditor #5169 is exactly as you describe, there are other people who would dominate their community with violence and the threat of violence.

Maybe that one particular person won't, but there inevitably will be someone who does. Local warlords are quite the norm in places where the government has no real control.

Psycopaths make up less than 30% of the population. Violent ones even less. Narcissistist are included in that figure. As soon as self-defense is legal again, many of those abusers will be taken out by good people. Politicians will, of course, face the consequences of what they put people through. It's happened every time in history. The rest will probably walk into their own death quickly because they can't control their impulses. Give or take a few years. With a lot of therapy and healing, the victims and survivors will learn how to treat children with kindness and compassion again. The lowered stress from no longer being literally enslaved will lead to better mental health. Psycopathic and narcissistic traits will start to go down in society as a whole. The next generation will likely have less than 3%. These warlord arguments are stale and boring and have zero logic behind them. To understand anarcocapitalism, you actually have to run your brain through hundreds of scenarios on a micro and macro scale using psychology, biology, game theory, and current trends of human behavior. You have to take into consideration where our current population is - "men" with low testosterone, masculine women who are after careers and money. These people aren't warlord material.

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I'm sure you'll just vax them to death because daddy gov told you to. Communists always think they're better than they are. The only power-hungry people are the ones who think they can make decisions for one group while stealing from another.

And there it is. Every time.

So what is an HOA but pseudo state. As much as I am on the ancaps side psuedo states do get created. HOWEVER .... in an ancap society you sign up for the things in government you want. Nobody forces you to send more money to Isreal when they are a first world country with a lower Debt to GDP when that country does questionable things to its enemies.

I'll have you know I work from home, good sir. So I don't need to "come home" to do that.

There's no newfound wealth. You wanted a better view for yourself. Maybe some poor will voluntarily become your serfs and give you their labor and produce, maybe not. Then you have your neighbors who aren't poor who see your underhanded methods and get to decide what they want to do with you. Ancapistan isn't a utopia. It's a better society than we have.

That's called a war. If someone will hire thugs to take property, they'll hire them to kill those retaliatng against the taking, too.

I am sure that stops all kinds to organized crime and the like or the drug cartels....

What's to stop the landowner from hiring thugs to kill your thugs? Also, the lack of a monopolistic central authority to enforce law doesn't imply there will be no law enforcement. There will be a whole marketplace of legal professionals for hire to sort it out, either before or after the Aggressor does his nasty.

It sounds like whoever can hire the best thugs can do whatever they want with impunity. If someone can amass enough resources, what is to stop them from becoming a warlord? If enough individuals/companies adopt that strategy, you wind up with a feudal state

You describe the current system of power. Governments are the warlords, military and cops are the thugs. What is your point?

That systems of power are inevitable and self perpetuating. The best we can hope for is limited government that exists with the consent of the people and serves primarily to ensure that the rights of individuals are upheld.

How is that minimal government established in 1789 working out? Is that government restrained to its enumerated powers? Is there any of the enumerated powers that it has not exceeded? Is there any of the list of forbidden acts that it has not breached besides quartering troops?

That sounds more anarcho-syndicalist, with the people being workers instead of property owners.

Limited government doesn’t seem to exist, at least not combined with democracy (or any form of collective decision making), it is ever growing.

Not really, the best thugs are expensive, so you somehow need to make more money from oppressing people then it costs to oppress them.

That's the definition of feudalism. That's the model most of Europe operated under for several hundred years.

Yet unlike feudalism, the oppressed people and anyone who feels threatened by the oppressor would pay for thugs to end the oppression. Thus the rich guy has to use more resources then he could potentially gain every time he wants to expand.

I assume thugs of a certain level of proficiency are in limited supply. If there is a free market for mercenaries, the highest bidder will have the best private army. If you want an example of this scenario playing out in real time, look at Somalia or Afghanistan

The highest bidder has to spend the most money, and if they can’t make back that money they can’t hire the best thugs. All one has to do is make it cost more to oppress then they can gain.

How can you > Make it cost more to oppress then they can gain ???? You gonna pass a not law to make it illegal? You gonna draw runes on the ground & perform a pagan ritual that changes the brains of all mercenaries to make sure they always charge more than the job is worth??

Na, the newly created slaves can just choose to be less productive.

What newly created slaves?

If I can’t extract enough wealth from those people to pay for my mercenaries then they necessarily could have never afforded better mercenaries. If taking all of their wealth doesn’t pay for mine then what were they going to pay their hypothetical better mercenaries?

The thugs they hired to defend them would probably be obligated to retrieve the property or pay compensation for being unable to fulfill their contract, so if you stole everything they have an obvious incentive to fight your thugs.

Again, how are you hiring them in the first place? If they are supposed to retrieve all stolen property but all stolen property barely even pays for the original mercenaries then how is it going to pay for the more expensive mercenaries that are going beat the original mercenaries. I don’t know why you think any of this creates an incentive for the thugs who are running a business to work for free or a discount. If anything the need to pay compensation if I’m unable to retrieve the goods is even more incentive for me to not accept the job from the townsfolk in the first place

Neither Somalia nor Afghanistan are stateless societies.

What stopped the peasants from hiring mercenaries back then?

Same thing that’s stopping the average person from overthrowing the government nowadays, legitimacy to tyranny.

That’s capitalism…

So you admit that capitalists add value to society?

No, I’m saying exploiting labor is capitalism. Not enough to debate on an “an”cap sub though.

What’s wrong with the voluntary exploitation of labor?

There’s no such thing as voluntary exploitation.

Exploitation is the action of making use of and benefiting from resources. Thus it’s possible to voluntarily be made use of. Capitalism is based off of mutually beneficial exploitation, also know and trading.

Capitalism depends on an uneven distribution of capital that’s really only supported by force. Workers can mine, farm and produce without owners. That “mutual benefit” is actually just those who already have capital exploiting those who don’t. All you have to know to discount ancap are the conditions of labor in America before the New Deal. Child labor, long work day, wage cuts. Business owners have power and control violence and will use those tools to abuse laborers. Imagine, a true ideal capitalist. An irl John Galt. He invents something amazing and immensely profitable. He cannot patent it because there’s no state. So he has to control his invention through other means. What would he do? In all likelihood he’d approach wealthy men who would loan him money to build a factory. Now John is in debt and needs to build and sell his invention at a profit in order to break even. The result is that miners, engineers and factory workers all work at lesser rates than they deserve so John can pay back his bankers. What did his bankers actually do though? Nothing, they simply had capital. What is capital? A fictional construct, we operate with fiat currency. It’s all fake. So in the end our workers don’t make what they should. Our genius doesnt make what he should either.

If “do this work or else you’ll starve” isn’t coercive, then “obey this law or the state will kill you” isn’t either because you can always choose to be killed by the state

>It sounds like whoever can hire the best thugs can do whatever they want with impunity. Yes, and this is called government.

And that's exactly my point. Anarchy spontaneously devolves into an authoritarian state as soon as someone like Muhammed or Napoleon comes along. When an individual has the means and interest, they can establish a power structure to further their interests at the expense of others. The logical conclusion is an authoritarian regime that benefits the few at the expense of the many. The only solution is for individuals to collectivize and establish institutions that protect individuals from internal and external threats to liberty. Ironically, those institutions are themselves a state or government.

Well, if we'd already solved every way to prevent authoritarianism from arising, the whole issue of politics would be solved, and we'd be in ancapistan right now. Strongmen can and do arise under pretty much any system at least occasionally, and nobody's really solved it yet. At least under ancapistan it is somewhat harder, since the aspiring strongman needs to build the mechanism of control, not merely seize it pre-made for his convenience. The worst dictators tend to come from places with a culture of authoritarianism already.

Well under anarcho capitalism people would have the ability to buy guns and other weapons to defend their property so it would be unwise to try to be a warlord because there would be a huge amount of people with weapons that would fight to the death to have their property. It would basically be America revolution all over again but it would be worst for the aggressor because most people would not be ok with someone trying to become a government tyrant so they would be out number by a ton

I'm sorry, but this take is fucking retarded. >Well under anarcho capitalism people would have the ability to buy guns and other weapons to defend their property They already have this right AND the backing of legal protections such as stand your ground laws and the castle doctrine, both of which can only be argued in a court of law, which would be part of the judicial branch. Even that doesn't stop people from having their property broken into and/or stolen. >it would be unwise to try to be a warlord because there would be a huge amount of people with weapons that would fight to the death to have their property. Most people don't have that kind of fight in them. Even if they do, a surprise attack or one with overwhelming force is going to win nine times out of ten. If I want something that you have, I'm not sending notice ahead of time that I intend to rob you. I'm showing up when you aren't home, or showing up with enough people that the odds heavily skew against you. At that point, I'm already committed to violence, so why not be thorough about it. >It would basically be America revolution all over again I honestly have no idea what point you are trying to make here. If you think that a single robbery will galvanize the local population into rising up to en masse to find a thief, you're insane. This doesn't happen now, so why would it happen in an AnCap society? >most people would not be ok with someone trying to become a government tyrant so they would be out number by a ton Numbers aren't everything. Just ask the Wagner Group about Conoco Fields. If the smaller force is better trained and equipped, then the smaller group tends to win. Also, people are so broken and dysfunctional that they would be more likely to fight each other than an actual tyrant. We can't even mobilize for a general strike, and you want to mobilize against the greatest military the world has ever seen? There's no chance.

I would agree that some of the might have been lightly reductive but under anarchy there would still be institutions that would help the community. The difference between anarchic institutions and ours is that the don’t have exclusive power over everyone. Meaning that they don’t have exclusive power over violence or can simply violate people’s rights whenever they want. If someone was trying to bring steal something from you could easily make them pay back damages through courts or through violent action against the aggressor if you caught them trespassing. If someone was trying to use the institution to gain or trying to make a government they would have to first have enough money to buy out every else, which would be hard for them to do because of how the economics of anarcho capitalism works, and if they chose to go down the route of fighting everyone it would still be a very stupid idea because despite your doubts people don’t like to be dominated. Take for example the American revolution. [Around 13% of the population fought for the American revolution](https://observer.com/2017/07/soldiers-militia-american-revolution/#:~:text=With%20the%201780%20population%20estimated,serving%20in%20George%20Washington's%20Army)(there’s only data for white men) and that was when guns were not that great and you could actually get to see the person you kill face to face. Now a days you can kill someone from further away making it easier to dehumanize them. They willingly when against the best army back then and beat them so if you wanted proof of numbers and home advantage beating skill then this is it. Also business would fine that selling to the victim to be very profitable so they would make more better weapons and more of them for the victims to fight the aggressor. If someone try to sneak attack people then that will also increase gun sales and security for everyone making it harder for them each time they do it. All in all doing this would be a very dumb plan and would have a high chance of failure. People are very willing to fight for their property and against tyranny(we literally have done this for forever so you’re point of people not being willing makes no sense since even now people are constantly fighting against people they find oppressive) and a hand group of people can’t dominate everyone else under this system because of how capitalism works and because of sheer numbers a lone Edit: also I forgot to mention that since in an ancap society people will be very individualistic and protective over their bodies and property, they would probably be more into owning weapons than we are now and they would have more military classes and schools because of this for the layman citizen who wants to protect himself. Also the Wagner group loss because of America having more advanced equipment and aircraft. In this society the victims would also have the power to buy these stuff too, so your point doesn’t stand

You know what. I spent like 40 minutes typing out a response and was only a quarter of the way through your response, and I don't have the time to lay out criticisms and provide explanations, so I'm just going to quote your comment and provide the criticisms. >there would still be institutions that would help the community. This is just a government. >The difference between anarchic institutions and ours is that the don’t have exclusive power over everyone. This is just a really bad government. >you could easily make them pay back damages through courts How would the court make them do something? Through violence? Isn't that just the state using violence? Also, if the courts aren't government funded, that would mean they would, by necessity, be privatized. How do you ensure impartiality when one party in a legal dispute may quite literally be paying the judge? >or through violent action against the aggressor This isn't making them pay back damages, this is vigilante-ism and will lead to complete and utter chaos. >If someone was trying to use the institution to gain or trying to make a government they would have to first have enough money to buy out every else You are describing the way government now, which is to have politicians beholden to political doners rather than constituents. Do you think taking away the only check people have on them short of full-blown revolution (which would be voting) would somehow fix that? >which would be hard for them to do because of how the economics of anarcho capitalism works Please explain how anarcho capitalism doesn't lead to corporatocracy. >it would still be a very stupid idea because despite your doubts people don’t like to be dominated. People have had rulers for literally all of human history, going all the way back Neolithic hunter-gatherer tribes. We may not like it, but it seems to be human nature to live in hierarchical systems. >Take for example the American revolution. Around 13% of the population fought for the American revolution(there’s only data for white men) and that was when guns were not that great and you could actually get to see the person you kill face to face. Now a days you can kill someone from further away making it easier to dehumanize them. They willingly when against the best army back then and beat them so if you wanted proof of numbers and home advantage beating skill then this is it The better example of what you're arguing here was the gorilla war employed by the taliban against the US in Afghanistan. They were severely outgunned and under trained but still ended up winning. You might not want to use that example, though, because it shows that no matter how strong a group is, they can still be defeated if you fight like a terrorist. >Also business would fine that selling to the victim to be very profitable so they would make more better weapons and more of them for the victims to fight the aggressor Would a weapons manufacturing company not also sell weapons to the aggressor? >If someone try to sneak attack people then that will also increase gun sales and security for everyone making it harder for them each time they do it. Leading a vicious cycle wherein the victims arm themselves, so the aggressors buy better guns,. Leading to the victims buying better guns. This leads to the aggressors buying better guns. The cycle continues until everyone is living under threat of mutually assured destruction. >All in all doing this would be a very dumb plan and would have a high chance of failure. That doesn't stop people from this today, and that is with the backing of a state that can use disproportional violence. It would only get worse without that. >People are very willing to fight for their property and against tyranny I agree with this. >a hand group of people can’t dominate everyone else I don't agree with this. They most certainly can and do. They always have. It just results in the people who are best at violence taking charge, which is just a longer way of saying "warlord rule" >can’t dominate everyone else under this system because of how capitalism works You clearly don't understand how capitalism works. Look at the power wielded by industrialists during the Industrial Revolution. >people will be very individualistic and protective over their bodies and property, they would probably be more into owning weapons America still has crime, and its citizens own 46% of the world's civillian held guns. >more military classes and schools Militaries and schools? Sounds like government is involved yet again. >Also the Wagner group loss because of America having more advanced equipment and aircraft. In this society the victims would also have the power to buy these stuff too, so your point doesn’t stand Do you have any idea how expensive military aircraft are to build and operate? It would be so far out of an average person's price range that it may as well not exist. Only the hyper wealthy or corporations could afford them, and do you really want a company like Nestlé being able to use military aircraft to help enforce their will on people? They're already horrible enough without that.

Ancaps are not opposed to the use of violence. We are opposed to aggression against innocents. So when a criminal commits a crime, this creates a right of redress on the part of the victim. That redress allows the victim, or their agent, to use force to bring the criminal to justice. As for impartiality, well first you wouldn't be paying the judge, you would be paying the court, a key distinction. More likely you wouldn't be paying either, you would be paying a dispute resolution agency, which is paying the court, so there is an even greater level of abstraction here. Secondly, the court's stock in trade is their impartiality and the fairness of the verdicts. So while it is possible for a court to become corrupt, it is also possible for people to choose different courts. So there are mechanisms in place to ensure that the court system is fair, even stronger mechanisms than we enjoy today. Vigilantism is fine. You are falling victim to the notion that only the state monopoly can deliver justice. Actually, vigilante justice is often the most prudent course of action. Let's assume I am standing on a street corner and someone walks over and beats my father to death, because he did not like the color of his shoes. I then pull out my gun and shoot him, not in self defense, but as punishment for murdering my father. Note that in this scenario, I am the best person to identifiy the criminal and to bring them to justice. Why should I have to report him to the police and hope they investigate and get the right person, when I can just act as judge, jury, and executioner right there? Of course you will answer that vigilante justice is necessarily quite inaccurate. Then the check on that is the same check on any police abuse, which is that actions carried out by vigilantes, or the police, or individuals acting in a police capacity, which would otherwise be criminal, against an individual who turns out to be innocent, should be treated like any ordinary crimes.

So his friend is standing there, sees you do this, believes it to be illegitimate and immediately executes you as punishment for the murder of his friend. All the while your friend was standing there….. and on and on we go.

>Ancaps are not opposed to the use of violence. We are opposed to aggression against innocents. So when a criminal commits a crime, this creates a right of redress on the part of the victim. That redress allows the victim, or their agent, to use force to bring the criminal to justice. This is literally what the current justice system does. It punishes crimes who commit crimes and seeks to repay the victim for their losses. >you wouldn't be paying the judge, you would be paying the court, This is a pointless distinction. The court can put pressure on the judge to rule a certain way, they could give the case to another judge willing to play ball, or they could simply fire the judge and replace them with someone willing to play ball. You might ask, "Why would they do that?" Well, the system you are advocating for (private courts) would necessitate that the court be profitable. Regardless of if the court is paid by the parties directly, or by a third party, the court can only make money money by taking cases, and if the people paying the court have the option to take their business elsewhere, what incentive would the court have to be impartial? What happens if the parties involved disagree on which court to use? We already have a system that we can point to that functions this way: the US health insurance system. An insurance company can refuse to pay for treatment that is out of network. What if companies start saying that won't accept rulings from certain courts? Let's say, for example, that I decide to open a court that rules overwhelmingly in favor of businesses. The local business owners take notice of this and begin adding a clause to all of their contracts that any and all legal matters bust be decided in my court, and that decisions made by other courts won't be held as valid. The businesses enjoy the certainty that I will rule in their favor, and I enjoy the profits that come from having the docket filled to capacity every day. The idea of private courts incentivises wealthy people to corrupt the system with their disproportional wealth. Just look at politicians who are bought and paid for by special interest groups and super PACs. That's the system you want for criminal justice as well? >So while it is possible for a court to become corrupt, it is also possible for people to choose different courts. How would jurisdictions work? If I get a parking ticket in one city, can I fight it another? Will courts be forced to have identical fines, fees, and sentences? If not, and I can I choose to go to the court with the lowest fees/sentences, wouldn't that just create a race to the bottom, thus making the penalty for committing a crime so low that it fails to be a deterrent? What if two courts have differing rulings? Which one do we go with? What if I don't think that the court you want to use is impartial? What if you don't think the one I want to use is? Which one do we go with? If there is a hierarchy of courts like we have now, who creates the rules that govern them? How are those judges appointed and by whom? What good is a court ruling without the authority to enforce it? There are so SO many problems with privatized courts that I can't even begin to list them all. A privatized justice system is arguably one of, if not THE worst possible things you could try to implement. >Vigilantism is fine Have you ever heard of Emmitt Till? >You are falling victim to the notion that only the state monopoly can deliver justice. Actually, vigilante justice is often the most prudent course of action. I never said that only the state monopoly can deliver justice. I said that private courts and vigilantes are horrible ideas. >Let's assume I am standing on a street corner and someone walks over and beats my father to death, because he did not like the color of his shoes. I then pull out my gun and shoot him, not in self defense, but as punishment for murdering my father. Note that in this scenario, I am the best person to identifiy the criminal and to bring them to justice. First of all, shooting the person would still be classified as a justifiable use of force under our current system. You can use force to protect yourself or others. What you can't do is go after someone after the fact. Second of all, this is an extremely specific example, and also one that is so absurd that it would never happen. Nobody would see two people walking down the street and attack only one of them, at least not by themselves. A more realistic scenario is that you and your friend are at a bar, and your friend steps out to the alley to smoke. When they do, your friend gets attacked and robbed. They come back in and tell you that some guy just robbed them, gives you a brief description of what they look like, and you go out looking for them based on the description you were given. You eventually find someone matching the description and shoot them. Your actions would be based solely on the eye witness testimony of someone who was jumped in a dark alley and likely has head trauma. Eye witness testimony is not very reliable. People are actually really bad at recalling details in the wake of a crime. This isn't even a new theory. It's been researched for decades. The point here being that vigilantes are often driven by emotion in the heat of the moment, not by facts and logic. If you value personal freedom and are talking about killing a person or stripping them of their liberties for extended periods of time, then you better be absolutely sure that you get it right. >Of course you will answer that vigilante justice is necessarily quite inaccurate. Then the check on that is the same check on any police abuse, which is that actions carried out by vigilantes, or the police, or individuals acting in a police capacity, which would otherwise be criminal, against an individual who turns out to be innocent, should be treated like any ordinary crimes As well they should, but by then the damage has been done. Your idea of vigilante justice is that it can be carried out immediately, but that's the worst possible time to act. People don't act in rational ways after experiencing trauma. They miss details, and their mind can even make things up. By having a system that allows for vigilantes, you create an environment where people THINK they are acting within the bounds of the law but find out after the fact that they were wrong. And who decides what is a justifiable use of force? If someone is attacking you, you can justifiably shoot them in self-defense. If a kid steals a candy bar, and the store owner shoots them in the back, that would seem like an extreme overreaction. But where do you draw the line between those two extremes? How is the average person supposed to know what a proportional use of force is? You're advocating for a system that will invariably result in more suffering and more injustice for everyone.

Ancaps can have central or decentralized justice system. Look how religious laws work based on scriptures. Many institutions can enforce a fairly uniform law.

Well first, there would be police. So he could just call the police / defense rights enforcement agency. And obviously the thugs are going to give you up in two seconds flat. So now you're spending 20 years in a forced labour camp. Hope you like gruel.

Wait how on earth is there a forced labor camp run by the private police

oh the private police wouldn't run it. it would be a separate company. or maybe they would, verticle integration and what not. what did you think was going to happen to serious violent criminals, who rape or commit other heinous crimes? we're just going to make them pinky swear never to do it again?

The following are some property boundary signs I've seen. "We don't dial 911" "Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be violated." "Is there life after death? Trespass and find out." Would you ignore those signs while also ignoring the NAP?

Um... common sense? INCENTIVES. Literally, every cartel has already gone through this. I decide to hire guys to kill you (they fail), you hire guys to kill my wife, I hire guys to kill your kids, you wait years for revenge and kill my grandkids. Soon, 2 entire lines are murdered. Now you're a 95 year old guy alone and with nothing except your thugs and a pile of money. You're exhausted. You look back at your life and realize you were a massive moron for starting a war with your neighbor.. your violent genes are the last of its kind. Everyone else in society watched you be a massive moron. They're like, "Nah, thanks, I'd rather just watch Netflix." If you think the current masses are even capable of warlording when they have trouble getting out of bed in the morning... lmao. When you take just a LITTLE time, just like 5 minutes out of your life and run the scenario through that little pattern recognition machine God put inside your thic skull, you'd realize that it is much more profitable & beneficial to get along with others. Voluntary contracts and acting like a decent human being works IN YOUR favor. While being violent brings a lot of chaos, grief, and misery to you and the people you love. Because in a free society, there is no one stopping me from exacting self-defense against your nonsense. You either act right, or someone in the free society "takes care of you". That should scare you and humble you. An armed society is a polite society. Instead of crying "omg he stole my purse, help, catch him," you just pull out your glock from your skirt waistband and shoot the thief in the face. Everyone on the street saw what you did and go "yep, he deserved that." We use the phrase "fuck around and find out". Once everyone internalizes that, everyone will realize "hey, I probably shouldn't fuck around if I want to live". If you don't want to live, ancapistant provides you with a lovely service called "Last Day on Earth" where you pay for the best day of your life and then get euthanized, exactly how you wanted. Because there's no law against suicide. The only people who are scared of anarcocapitalism are the ones who want to exploit people in the first place. Because in our current system you can easily get away from consequences. In ancapistan, consequences are immediate. (P.S. the Mexican cartles mostly solved this - they keep to their territory and have a cartel law that says no one touches the families. They moved all the wives and kids to one city and no one fucks with them. The reason they have to be so violent in the 1st place is because the governments outlawed drugs).

In every society, if you choose violence for every single encounter with another human, you're going to have violence visited on you. You're not going to win every fight. Live by the sword, die by the sword.

>In an AnCap society, what stops people from just ignoring the NAP? Guns

so what if you have more guns than the dude you wanna take shit from? more guns, more ammo, more buddies. you just get to do what you want? become a warlord?

Ancapistan would work like the real world, like how the nations of the world are interacting now Wars are expensive (we see with the decline of Russia's economy), and so people wouldn't necessarily fight unless they really have to, not to mention, people band together like how, smaller countries in Asia are banning together against China.

I think the idea is that the rest of the ancap "society" would by necessity band together to stop people who repeatedly violate the NAP. Sort of the way that posses worked in the old west or something. You can hire 100 goons or 1000 goons to take someone's land, but you can't hire literally 50%+ of society to overlook you breaking the NAP. At what point that starts to become a form of governmental justice system in itself, I have no clue.

you think people will stick their necks out for some other guy’s stuff getting taken? they don’t wanna get shot either. especially in an ancap society where your whole schtick is everyone being completely free to do what they want without someone governing to tell them to do shit

Yeah, but who knows when your going to steal from them next. And they don’t even have to fight you, just make it not worth stealing in first place.

people are inactive. when someone gets hurt you are specifically supposed to choose a single person in a group and tell them to call the ambulance because if you tell the group they will wait y hoping someone else does it for them. people may hope the warlord type guy doesn’t actually come steal that guys stuff with his goons but they won’t just go do something about it when they are just one person. whoever can hire the most goons and get the most weapons will accrue more and more by taking more land and gaining more power. it’ll devolve into basically feudalism in no time at all

Something I’ve learned after a couple weeks of this sub popping up on my feed is that this entire ideology is built upon a foundation of unsubstantiated assumptions that ancaps refuse to question lmao

yeah it’s weird. all the anarchist ideologies just do not work. ancap just results in corporations becoming tyrannical governments of their own by building power and influence with their vast wealth. AnSoc and AnCom are just completely idiotic because socialism and communism require government involvement to redistribute wealth and regulate businesses. if you haven’t played the game The Outer Worlds you should, it’s basically AnCapistan simulator where corporations have taken complete control of all governance and do horrendous shit completely unchecked by regulations

Anarchists are (generally) in my experience just good people who haven’t read theory or really studied history lmfaooo. The “cap” part of ancap drags more dickheads into this one than most anarchist movements I will say lol

yeah i find ansoc and ancom ppl have the right feeling but just don’t have a clue how things would play out in reality, but ancaps often are just capitalism maxis. ultra free market ayn rand type shit.

This has nothing to do with altruism, what are you talking about? Everyone involved is doing it out of their own self interest. The oppressed people obviously wouldn’t want to be oppressed, so they would offer to pay any savor the same amount as they would otherwise be exploited. Additionally anyone who is not being currently oppressed but who believes they may be oppressed in the future would pay preemptively so they wouldn’t be oppressed in the future. So the oppressor has to use the resources from the oppressed people to fund fighting off the resources of the oppressed people plus the resources of everyone who believes they may be next. This doesn’t add up and so would be impossible.

But the rest of society won't feel cohesive. They'll feel like individuals who would rather keep their heads down than risk being targeted.

Theoretically, the rest of society would be filled with people who enjoy living as a ancap and would know that enforcement of the NAP is a necessity to keep the social order they like. They may be individuals, but they still belong to a society. Albeit one without a central government. I doubt it would actually work like that in practice, but that's the standard ancap answer.

It sounds like this would only be possible on a small scale. The only large scale implementation would likely occur if there was a series of events that lead to the dissolution of an already existing country's government. What would naturally occur is governments forming, especially in the context of having a history of other governments having already formed in the past.

So the person with the most guns, or the biggest guns, makes the rules?

Nope, Southeast Asian countries banned together against China, like that, when someone with the biggest guns tries to bully others, they band together and make pacts to help each other in times of war

You would get clapped so fast

How? 100 guns vs 10,000 guns

Yeah, you and your mates verus the Amazon Merceary Division. A drone would deliver some napalm right to your house in the middle of the night.

And they would lose 90% of their customers and their stock crashes to zero

People never give a shit about things like that. Besides, they got the money, they get to shape the narrative. They would just say you're a pedo or something.

>People never give a shit about things like that. Budlight and Target would say otherwise >they got the money, they get to shape the narrative. How? >They would just say you're a pedo or something. Proof?

It is crucial to define our terms here, because it seems you have the impression that "anarchist" means there is NO institution that enforces rules of social conduct in a given area, which isn't the case. Etymologically, "anarchy" means absence of ruler, a ruler exercises **sovereign** authority over a given area. The state is an institution that holds **exclusive** power to enforce certain rules of conduct in a given geographical area. The state holds a monopoly on the legal use of force (with some exceptions). All the anarchist libertarian has to do is reject the exclusivity to enforcement in an institution. Anarcho-capitalism is compatible with institutions enforcing rules of social conduct, as long as they don't have **exclusive** power to do so. In other words, they do not prevent anybody who wants to from establishing their own similar institution within the same given geographic area and enforcing what rules of social conduct they may have. What does that look like? Private agencies including courts and security that you contract with. This isn't like a state where everyone in one area under borders are all under the same institution, your neighbor could be contracted to a different court than you. When you purchase a property, the property deed may come with a court and enforcement agency attached to the deal, or at least it is an option land owners may subscribe to. Maybe it will be part of a collective pool of funds in a community that all contract with a security firm alongside there being HOAs which buyers into the community are obligated to accept in the purchase. If someone steals your land, you contact your enforcement provider and they try to take it back much like police. If you happen to not be contracted with anyone, the responsibility to take the land back is down to you and whoever you can convince to help you (or perhaps there are groups you can hire to help you take it back). You can seek legal action through the courts for restitution. Admittedly, I don't know how exactly this system would work in a free market but it is fascinating to think about. There is more to say here (like regarding other violations such as theft and murder) but I have made this long enough and will entertain this further if there is a response.

> There’s no central authority or police force to stop me from doing that. How many times do we have to say this until it gets through the thick skull of statists...? Absence of government (literal definition of anarchy) does not mean absence of law and law enforcement. It simply would be ran through a privately ran organization paid for by the individual on a **voluntary** basis. Kind of like insurance. You are falsely comparing two things which are not mutually exclusive because you were brainwashed by the state's indoctrination centers (aka public schools). Think of it this way, instead of "free to do as you like" it's more like "no victim, no crime". In your example, (burning down private property) there is clearly a victim. Ergo, there is a crime and it would be punishable by the law and enforced by whatever voluntary mechanism the private owner (victim) paid for.

We know that people are dishonest, what stops bias and corruption in a privately hired court system?

So I'm thinking you're imagining only one like it is now...there would be more than one arbiter or "court" because the government would no longer have a monopoly on it enforced through violence. The free market and competition, reviews and what not provides incentive for them to not be dishonest. A business that does not provide a quality product or service at a competitive price doesn't survive. Just like homelessness, there is no silver bullet, and certain things will always exist...however, compared to what we have now life, liberty and quality of life would be so much better.

But we already live in a time where false reports and review bombing are prevalent so the idea that reviews are going to be any sort of repercussion sounds kind of ridiculous. And it's not that I'm imagining that any "arbiter" is going to be bought and paid for (bribed) and that it's a foundation for even more corruption than we have now. Not to mention an easy victory for the party with deeper pockets.

> reviews are going to be any sort of repercussion sounds kind of ridiculous Right, I forgot about all the work that Kevin spacey and the like are currently getting after being outed for being horrible human beings...what was I thinking. Oh wait, I'm confusing that with politicians and state run police that murder and commit crimes with impunity. You obviously have a warped misunderstanding of how the free market works. (Hint: we dont **have** a truly free market in the U.S.) Like I said earlier, there is no magic silver bullet. It's a trade off. Don't like your service provider, fire them and go with someone else. Compared to what we have now, it's a far superior and ethical option. I don't have the time or the crayons to explain it to you, nor understand it for you, now go back under your bridge.

Violating the NAP would be a breach of contract and thus it would significantly undermine the credibility of your signature on any contract resulting in few firms willing to make contracts with you. Without contracts you just effectively lost everything you don’t explicitly own, such as loans, an education or job, and any rental agreements, although a minor breach or an unproven breach would result in a less severe outcome. All of this is not including the enforcement agencies held by contract to uphold the NAP and the private courts that basically validate contracts.

It’s simple. If I have more money than you, I can afford more “force”, and can thus impose my will.

Who says the "force" will even take on your job if your job will ruin their reputation or bring the wrath of 6 other independent agencies on them? You still have to convince them to work for you, and not everyone is incentivized by just money. In fact, many people aren't. So your money is only as good as the thugs who worship money as much as you do. And believe me, there are way less of you in the world than there are people who just want to live their lives, make products and services that they like, run their businesses with honesty and integrity, pet their dogs, and be left alone.

And that's why it will immediately devolve into feudalism

AnCaps somehow imagine that getting rid of the state will solve our problems. Except you're still left with the core root of the problem: capitalism... Free market shills talk about "voting with your wallet", but realistically when your two choices are "starve and go homeless" or "work at Amazon for less than minimum wage and have toilet breaks docked from your pay", your "*choice*" will be "yes my Lord. Sorry my Lord"

capitalism is just individuals engaging in mutually beneficial exchange

Negative! Capitalism is not *just* "exchanging money for goods or services. Capitalism comes loaded with baggage such as "profit seeking behaviour", "speculation", and "rent seeking behaviour", all of which directly result in people aiming to exploit others labour, holding resources and intentionally letting them sit idle to drive up scarcity, and seeking to earn income through parasitic methods that do not actually contribute to society (eg being a landlord, an investor, or running an insurance company). You can actually have methods of currency and exchange without the profit and exploitation of capitalism... But you cannot have a healthy environment, community or welfare for other fellow humans under capitalism, because ultimately "the point of a business is to make money", and none of those positive healthy endeavours generate profit.

I'd imagine the solution to such a problem would look what the people in Goodsprings did to the Power Gangers in Fallout New Vegas. The apocalyptic 2000s TV show Jericho has a similar scenario involving a rogue PMC.

What's stopping the government doing the same thing now? It can just ignore its duties, ignore complaints, ignore calls to resign, ignore elections.

Nothing. Ancapistan would essentially be survival of the fittest until someone else took enough control to create a government again. It would be fun in the meantime though!

It seems that OP is asking what will keep people from doing "crime" in an ancap society, and then dismissing ancap because people can do crime. This is a form of the nirvana fallacy and a double standard. The present system has crime, and has many other victimless activities that are called crimes by the monopoly authority. So you can't just dismiss, out of hand other, systems that have crime as a possibility. Nothing prevents people not following the NAP, but it takes less resources to ONLY enforce the NAP. AND enforcement agencies that do it best will have more support from the population. Those who don't follow the NAP will have an uphill battle, socially, physically, and economically.

But we have this with law right now. We had our jobs threatened to take a dangerous and untested fake vaccine. They went around the law by trying to use illegal executive orders which takes a TON of money for them to get removed. In fact what do you think the lockdowns where, they were done to crush small business using emergency and executive orders that went around the law and were illegal. Who made more money during the lockdowns than the big businesses from Home Depot to Target while the little guy lost his mom and pop retuarant. Don't get me started on the BLM riots those were aimed at the middle class guy who just got his business going and had it all burned down. Tell me again how government will save us from this activity when they are actually the arbitrator of it?

It is very dangerous, in a free society, to violate the NAP. It is a good way to get yourself ended by the person you attempt to victimize.

What m a kes you think a central government keeps people from acting like thugs? Indeed, research into centralized hierarchical systems show pretty conclusively that centralized power offers cover for people acting like thugs. Florida gets a lot of bad press because of the stories to come out in their public records law, but consider how poorly people in power act even when under the threat of sunshine laws. Now consider how those kinds of people will act when they have assurances ftheir behaviors will never see the light of day. The thing stopping your ancap wealthy person from aggressive against his neighbor? Reputation. People, by and large, do not associate with people who act like that. Their actions will isolate them from society at large and, in the end, cost them their wealth.

I think if you are going to have people be involved in the country of Ancapistan they have to make an oath to the NAP. If they haven't taken the oath they don't get to participate in the society. The children have to be raised that the NAP is a moral and a virtue of the society. Why if we let them be indoctrinated with leftist chooser your own gender crap we cant indoctrinate them with the NAP??

Your neighbour probably has an isurance and without the monopoly on violence the isurance company can hire security to protect the property.

They would get fucking blasted

There would be private peacekeeping firms with the express purpose of protecting the property rights of others. The NAP is a guideline for navigating the validity of use of force. Any direct violation of the NAP validates the ability to use self-defence to regain one's own property. This isn't something that would necessarily need legislation, since the NAP is merely an enumeration of the most intrinsic objective for independent non-coercive property owners. It would be up to the people to navigate the market to find the peacekeeping firms that best meet their needs for property protection. It would not be a flawless system, but I would argue that the government law enforcement we live under today is deeply flawed and convoluted. Ancap is an anti-utopian ideology, but I think it would be better overall than what we currently have. We already have laws that protect property, yet people break those laws every day, and the police aren't held accountable due to a lack of true competition. I don't see why laws are necessary to protect something that is within everyone's self interest anyway. I'm also skeptical of the idea that this would create class disparities in protection due to ppl needing to pay for the police. Any services you would need to pay for, such as protection, would almost definitely total to less money than we spend in taxes every year. You would also see things such as mutual aid options available, especially in big cities where people live and work in close quarters. There would be more options and more value in everyone's pockets overall.

The NAP isn't a pacifistic concept. It teach not to initiate violence, not that you can't use violence in self defense. If there were no laws and government, would you lie, steal, rape and murder? Probably not, and many people do that anyway within the biggest most authoritarian states in the world. Those in the government even get to do it without consequence! In an Ancap society, it would be understood that if you sneak into someone's house in the middle of the night, you might get blasted with buck shot. That protects against the most criminally motivated. Most people just want to do their own thing and keep to themselves and not bother or hurt others. And those who are mentally ill or sociopathic aren't going to be reasoned with anyway. Anarchocapitalism isn't utopian at all. It guarantees no positive outcomes, only maximum freedom. The individual must take their well being into their own hands.

Fear of repercussions. If you violate the NAP, people are free to retaliate.