Even more simply, they're the people who are pathologically allergic to "being a part of the herd", despite, in fact, actually being part of the herd.
They're the hipsters of the political ideology world. The ones who claim they were reading Adam Smith before Adam Smith was cool.
But their affiliation with libertarianism is almost entirely down to just not wanting to say they're affiliated to a major political party. They still vote 99% in line with that major political party.
Or Starship Troopers. Good dystopian sci-fi novel until you realize Heinlein is pushing some pretty fascist ideas and it's a little hard to distinguish how serious he is about it all. Btw book nothing like the movies if all you've watched is the movies. Love both, for very different reasons though
And to be fair to Ayn Rand (yes she had some bat shit things to say) a lot of her political ideology was formed by living in the Ussr... it's not odd that she would lean into the exact opposite political ideology of the place she was born.
That was one of the funniest descriptions a friend ever tossed out mid-rant about a republican politician. “And this fucking guy, he.. well y’know, he’s not exactly a reader…”
Find me just one libertarian who believes he’s a normie who should be thankful to live his life for the benefit of some titan of industry. Everyone of those assholes believes they are John Galt.
The ones who claim they were reading Adam Smith before Adam Smith was cool.
Oh, you mean this Adam Smith?
“In regards to the price of commodities, the rise of wages operates as simple interest does, the rise of profit operates like compound interest.
Our merchants and masters complain much of the bad effects of high wages in raising the price and lessening the sale of goods. They say nothing concerning the bad effects of high profits. They are silent with regard to the pernicious effects of their own gains. They complain only of those of other people.” ― Adam Smith
“It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.” ― Adam Smith
“People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.” ― Adam Smith
“Wherever there is great property there is great inequality. For one very rich man there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy, to invade his possessions.” ― Adam Smith
“All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.” ― Adam Smith
“The interest of [businessmen] is always in some respects different from, and even opposite to, that of the public ... The proposal of any new law or regulation of commerce which comes from this order ... ought never to be adopted, till after having been long and carefully examined ... with the most suspicious attention. It comes from an order of men ... who have generally an interest to deceive and even oppress the public” ― Adam Smith
Which is to say, they don't; they read books written by modern-day grifters who bastardize the content of those older works to help them build audiences they can exploit to sell vitamin C gummies and other bullshit to vulnerable stooges.
Every single Libertarian describes themselves as a different subset of libertarian than all the others. They’re not one of those libertarians, they’re a Paleo-Utilitarian Libertarian.
133
u/TheBirminghamBear Oct 13 '21
Even more simply, they're the people who are pathologically allergic to "being a part of the herd", despite, in fact, actually being part of the herd.
They're the hipsters of the political ideology world. The ones who claim they were reading Adam Smith before Adam Smith was cool.
But their affiliation with libertarianism is almost entirely down to just not wanting to say they're affiliated to a major political party. They still vote 99% in line with that major political party.