Why I cannot be libertarian

I have said to many folks, particularly my libertarian friends, that I want to be a libertarian so bad I can taste it. And I mean that. So what keeps me from signing on?

A handful of issues, for starters: as a group, they support abortion; they don't care for an aggressive foreign policy; and I simply can't quite come around on drug questions. Further, and this will sound very odd coming from me, they have too much of a distrust of government. Like it or not, there are things which only a government can do. Keeping order, for one, and keeping real and potential enemies at bay with the aggressive measures necessary. Then there's that pesky fact that freedom, which they champion to excess quite frankly, is a means rather than an end. Freedom is how we do things, not why, and while as a conservative I believe that the society which is best is one with the greatest rational amount of freedom, freedom as freedom cannot justify one solitary thing. This leads to I think the root problem with libertarianism as it stands today. It is the belief that the individual is the final arbiter of morality, the one who sets the standard for right and wrong.

No individual can hold this kind of power. On a practical level, it invites anarchy, or worse: a might makes right society. On a philosophic level, it begs one very important question: if I, as an individual, can make up my own mind about people and things, why should I ever listen to you? No progress can be made from such a starting point in ethics, which certainly means nothing can be done in any other area either.

If libertarians were to admit that it is not the individual (or that weak sister, consensus) which dictates what can and cannot be done, that justice and rightness exist outside of those realms having a genuine being of their own, I may reconsider my position. Until then, they are as bad as liberals: they want what they want because they want it. It is a poor substitute for critical thought on critical issues.

Libertarians sell Conservatives a Bill of Goods

One area which libertarians pride themselves on is that they hold few positions on the issues. As such you can, in theory, be both Catholic and libertarian. You just can't force your Catholicism on others. Similarly, libertarianism is sold to conservatives in general. One can be anti-abortion and still be libertarian because there is no libertarian position on abortion. It sounds good, and if it weren't for one teensy trifle we might actually accept the premise.

The trifle, you say? Well, simply that libertarians do hold positions on the issues and to become libertarian, you must hold those positions too.

Yes, before someone argues otherwise, they do hold positions on the issues, even issues such as abortion. They think a woman who wants one should be allowed to have one. This is not a neutral stance: this is being pro-abortion. It's no different than the tired liberal saw (which many if not all seem to accept) which states, "I'm personally opposed, but..." If you believe that abortion should be allowable then you are in favor of it and that's you're actual position on the matter. To say anything less is disingenuous, quite frankly.

Abortion is but one example, so there's no point running down the litany of relative political positions. Yet there is a further problem involving things such as abortion. If we can't work against it through the law and remain libertarian, then libertarianism becomes a shell. It asks us to give up on a very basic principle through which by surrendering we have violated our most basic and essential beliefs. It asks us to give up not only the vaunted individualism which the creed champions (a pretty obvious point when you think about it) it really asks us to give up our souls. How can we be people who believe in the dignity of others if we have no yardstick by which to grade human behavior?

Libertarians have positions on the issues; there could be no libertarian movement if this were not true. It's time they acknowledged as much, and played fair with Right Reason and human intellect.