Don Paskini tries to engage with libertarians, but comes unstuck. Not least because he can’t find anyone discussing the matter that he has in mind. Although, fair do’s for trying.
Actually, I haven’t discussed it either. I have been busy working lately and over the weekend, I was effectively off line anyway. That’s the problem with choosing a narrow field of discussion for engagement. Anyway, Don took a little trip around some of the regulars and was disappointed with what he found.
I was going to point out that he had managed to misrepresent all of the arguments being put forward, but Jonathan Miller got in there before me.
So, in general, the lessons from this are; the Liberal test is not to be taken too seriously. It was making a point about the appropriation of the word “liberal” by people who are very much not liberal.
If you want to engage with libertarians, by all means do so, but starting off with a strawman might not be the best tack to take.
And, finally, just because people are not discussing the story you want to discuss, it doesn’t mean that they are not libertarian or don’t care, it may simply mean that they have not picked up on it – as I had not. Some of us have lives outside of this blogging thingy, you know.
The other thing is that there are plenty of other people writing about police databanks. We’re individualists and want to write about things that other people aren’t.
That, too. Although it was a reasonable assumption on Don’s part that one of us would have picked up on it.
Lives? Outside of the Interwebs? How does that work then? 😉
I think it’s called virtual reality.