The Personality Conflict Within Libertarianism
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
118.35359
Summary
The problem with libertarianism is not that it's stupid, it's that it doesn't work. And that's because there are two very different types of libertarianism, and they are very different from each other in every facet of our political discourse.
Transcript
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And so, libertarianism, it's a constant bugbear around these parts.
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On the one hand, it is so bloody sensible and tempting and you want to agree with it.
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And yet, at the same time, it is so ridiculous and destructive and annoying and frustrating.
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And so, maybe I should write a bloody book about the problems with libertarianism.
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But in this video, I'd like to focus on one particular aspect of what's going on in our
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political discourse that makes libertarianism such an attractive option and yet such a dead
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And it has to do with individual temperament and the sort of people who become libertarians.
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Now, the big five personality traits, I'll link to them down below.
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It's the best description, the most solidly backed up by experimental data definition of
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There's five dimensions to personality, but there's two in particular that I'm going to
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be looking at because these two personality traits are very, very, very strongly correlated
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And those traits are conscientiousness and openness to new experience.
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Now, conscientiousness is how organized you are and how prone to being disgusted you are.
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So if you are high in conscientiousness, you hate filth, you hate vermin, spiders, snakes, you
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clean frequently and you avoid disease, you keep your stuff all together.
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If you're low in conscientiousness, you're going to be more disorganized, more chaotic, more
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Now, openness to experience is a different trait entirely.
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Soldiers, for example, tend to be very, very conscientious.
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They have all their kit sorted out, but they're also very open to new experiences.
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Whereas people that are closed to new experiences, they want a predictable,
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So the classic Republican, the archetypal Republican, is somebody that's very strict, even anal, about
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You know, everything needs to be organized and clean and, you know, nothing unpredictable there,
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So the archetypal Republican is that fuddy-duddy living in suburbia that gets upset whenever
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the kids are listening to the new music and tries to pass bylaws all the time.
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The archetypal Democrat, very low conscientiousness that they're very disorganized.
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Like, they don't mind being in a dirty neighborhood.
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They're always looking, oh, let's try, like, sushi.
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You know, that would freak out the Republican, because raw fish sounds like you can get disease.
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And it's, like, from one of those weird yellow people cultures.
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You know, the liberal is not afraid of disease, or less afraid of disease, and loves the fact
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Now, there's two variations, two variants, that you get on these personality traits.
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There's the person that is very high conscientiousness, but very open to new experience.
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Very open to new experience, but very, very disciplined.
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Likes everything being sorted out and kitted away.
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The inverse of that is the person that is terrified of new experiences.
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Doesn't know how to get along with the hippies.
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All right, the hippies are always doing all this new stuff, and that scares the crap out of him.
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But at the same time, very low in conscientiousness, very disorganized, very messy.
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And so what happens is that these two completely opposite personalities both become libertarians.
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Because if you are, if you seek out new experiences, if you are entrepreneurial, if you are artistic,
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you're not really going to fit in with Republican circles all that well.
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And actually, like, if you look at the entire, the manosphere and the alt-right,
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these are generally people that are, they're very open to new experiences.
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They like hanging out with, even with the hippies sometimes.
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At least the hippies are doing something interesting once in a while.
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Even if they're dirty, you've just got to clean your hands afterwards.
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Like, we need some rules to keep people sorted out.
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The other type of libertarian is terrified of new experiences, but very disorganized themselves.
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And so this is what is colloquially called the autistic libertarian.
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See, the sort of people, the heroic libertarians that are held up there,
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as like, look at this great entrepreneur doing all these crazy, wonderful things.
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That's the sort of libertarian that, you know, if they're working in Silicon Valley,
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You know, like, they're a millionaire that doesn't wear a suit.
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Whereas the autistic libertarian loves to go to these conventions that mimic Republican conventions,
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But they don't have to be just, they don't have to be organized.
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So what they tend to talk about libertarian-wise is how there's not going to be any rules to
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govern them whatsoever, because they're disorganized and they don't want to be told to be organized.
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Like, if they try and hang out with Republicans, Republicans will say, hey, get your shit together.
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Whereas the upper form of libertarian, they hang out with Republicans,
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and the Republicans will say, stop listening to that new music.
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What, what, why are you dressing differently than us?
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That's, that's new and strange, and it makes me afraid.
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You know, this person goes and hangs out with the Democrats, with the hippies,
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and, you know, he's like, hey, I like what you hippies are doing,
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I like all this cool stuff, but why can't you guys get your shit together?
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You know, the, the lower form hangs out with the, the hippies,
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and he gets upset because they're all, he doesn't know what's going on,
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they're always doing new things, and he's not comfortable doing new things,
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even though they accept him for being a disorganized mess.
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And so you, when you get these two groups of people together,
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and they're both calling themselves libertarian,
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you know, the, the entrepreneurial libertarian says, you know,
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I want less restrictions on me being able to do my, my thing,
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because I don't need society looking out for me.
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You know, I, I want to go be an entrepreneur, I want to go explore,
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The other one's saying, I don't want society forcing me to follow society's rules,
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You know, but I also want the security offered by society.
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So I want to go to conventions that are just like the conventions I've seen on TV.
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You know, I want this safe, predictable environment,
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where I'm not held to any standards whatsoever.
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And so this, this latter form, the degenerate libertarian,
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they are the ones that constantly reread, reread, and reread Rothbard,
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or Mises, or whomever, because it's comfortable for them,
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it's twofold, and it comes from these opposite personalities.
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these two personalities are in complete disagreement,
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even though they're ostensibly saying the same things.
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On the surface, they're sort of saying the same thing.
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But they're doing it for completely opposite purposes.
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The entrepreneurial one, he already is kidded away.
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He doesn't need rules to tell him to be kidded away.
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The degenerate one just doesn't want to be kidded away.
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And the second issue is that the entrepreneurial libertarian,
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He doesn't want to go to a conference and talk about Rothbard
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And so the people who dominate within the libertarian party
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with a system, with a structure, that doesn't change.
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And then you get the bulk of the libertarian party
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Like, both sides are going to be hostile to one another.
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But they're going to be the ones going to these conventions
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will move on from it and go do something amazing.
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that don't want nobody telling them not to look at porn,
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don't want nobody saying they can't use their drugs,
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but at the same time are terrified of doing anything new