Extreme Liberty

Let's see how extreme I can get about liberty. In defense of freedom and liberty, I advocate an end to all private property.

Let me start with an anecdote. In the subdivision where I live, I often want to walk over to the local shopping mall. But my house is at the end of a curving street on a cul-de-sac. So to get to the mall, I have to walk down the street a long way to the main road, and then walk almost all the way back to the mall. It is much easier for me to simply cut across a few front lawns and a few back lawns and get to the same spot more or less in a straight line.

But most often I don't. To do so I would have to "violate" my neighbors private property and I don't really feel comfortable doing that. But in doing so, I am limiting my absolute freedom of movement. And my neighbors, by law, can insist that I do. Their private property is an imposition on me and an infringement of my liberty.

If we value our liberty too highly, if we are unwilling to compromise our freedoms in order to avoid conflict and to get along with one another, we would have to dispense with the notion of private property. Private property is, quite literally, tyranny!

But of course, to insist so completely on our freedom and liberty would be completely irrational. It would mean that we would be in constant social conflict and unable to advance our material well being. Such liberty would not be in our self interest, nor in the best interest of others. So we compromise our freedom and accept some notion of private property. For our own good. And for the good of all.

A system of justice is a systematic way of structuring our social interactions so that we can avoid the conflicts of interest that inevitably arise in social life. It enables social intercourse by resolving conflict, and allows us to gain the benefits of social cooperation. It always entails some compromise of liberty, some compromise of equality, some concept of private ownership and some concept of sharing. In a humane and just society no one social value is pursued to the exclusion of all others. To do so would be inhumane, and would ultimately create a society that is unfair and impoverished.