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The truth is that around the age of 23 I by and large became a libertarian because of the type of abstract epistemological principles that James C. Scott talks about, but very quickly avoided using that word because people automatically associated it with red tribe.
My views have become much more nebulous since due to what I consider a lot of reductive discourse that straw-mans tons of things as "command and control" when it's not that simple even regarding *gasp* communism.
But the mischaracterization of all libertarianism still annoys me.
But the mischaracterization of all libertarianism still annoys me.
Like no, not every person who identifies as libertarian is just looking for some excuse to not pay taxes or not help other people or shoot anyone that steps on their lawn. A lot of people actually think that things *work* better if top-down players are taken out of the loop.
Of course this is why I hate labels anyway. Words matter, they're not mere fingers that point to concepts that pre-exist in some firmament, but *labels* are basically a way of acting as if this is what words do but then judging people based on *your* idea of what the label means.
But if one *must* use labels, I was for all intents and purposes both left wing and libertarian throughout my twenties, and very much a whig not because I thought things were great but because it was too dangerous not to protect the idea of individual rights with a total firewall
And at the same time, did not identify as a conservative, but believed they had and still have one and only one valid foundational point: that the world we've built up is so complex that we *must* exercise caution with how we tinker with it lest we lose *everything*
And even then, that view has evolved a lot: whereas before I liked Burke but hated the people who wielded him as a bludgeon in bad faith, I now think that Burke's attachment to *sentiment* as some kind of tacit wisdom is vague fatalistic nonsense, fuck sentimentalism.
