From: Michael S. Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Tue Dec 12 2000 - 15:20:58 MST
hal@finney.org wrote:
>
> Mike Lorrey writes, quoting Hal:
> > > Actually, I think the resolution is that the slogan is short for
> > > "*private* property is theft", and it envisions the existence of public
> > > property. Hence theft is perfectly possible, and private property is
> > > theft from the public.
> >
> > However, as my later comments state, if it is the public's chosen agent
> > (i.e. government) which sells/rents/leases that property to individuals,
> > it is not theft, since the public is getting freely exchanged value for
> > that property which it wishes to sell.
>
> To be clear, I am not arguing that property is theft. Rather, I am
> arguing against the position advanced by Samantha and supported by Mike,
> that the slogan is self-contradictory and meaningless.
It is. It makes no delineation between public and private property.
Since the person who came up with it, Bakunin, was an anarchist, his
position was that land is ownerless in its raw state, but he was not so
pedantic about it as, say, a Georgist. He was not for the confiscation
of the product of one's labor either. His quote got distorted by the
statist communists and socialists who despised him so thoroughly.
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