My argument against slavery is that it is unfalsifiable. A slave has no more agency than a dog or a table; otherwise, they wouldn't be a slave. Further, even if slaves were allowed to contest their slavery, it is impossible to prove one is not a slave. Contracts can be forged.
The only possible solution is basing slavery on some immutable physical characteristic, such as ... skin color, and then you run into interbreeding problems. One drop rule? Grandparent rule? All too easy to forge.
The existence of legal slavery turns the default condition of man into slavery. The only free people are those with wealth, power, and pure luck, and there's no guarantee how long that will last.
That's not a principled argument following from self-ownership or anything similar. It's just a pragmatic argument that no legal system can allow slavery.
There's another, possibly more practical, reason. A slave is a tool who does what his owner tells him to, just as hammer or saw is a tool with no free will. The responsibility and accountability lie entirely with the slave owner, not the slave. That is the definition of being a slave, the lack of agency.
If Alice is found murdered with a gun and the gun is traced back to slave Bob, and further evidence shows Bob's owner Carol ordered Bob to murder Alice, Carol is put on trial for murder, not Bob. If I were involuntary slave Bob, my first murder victim would be my owner Alice, and because my owner had taken upon herself all accountability and responsibility, she must have told me to kill her; she committed suicide.
A legal system which recognizes slavery as a valid institution and claims to be consistent has to follow that course. Of course none would. They would execute Bob just as one does a rabid dog. But that would be proof of their inconsistency and proof that slavery is inhumane for forcing unwilling slaves to do things they would never do voluntarily.
The US has stopped conscription for a while, but it's still a very active thing in other allied countries, like Ukraine, South Korea, and Israel. It's worth reflecting on whether the draft in those countries seems immoral.
To me, libertarianism is a matter of degree, and just about the least libertarian situation is if there was a risk that my country would be invaded by an authoritatian neighbor. If I were Ukrainian I really wouldn't want Ukraine to stop the draft if that meant folding to Russia. So this is another case where to me the "axiomatic" case seems much weaker than a "pragmatic" one.
First, you fail to distinguish between government and society. "Country" as you use it means government, not society.
In that existential crisis case, if people won't volunteer to risk death for their government, then they apparently don't think it's an existential crisis, and the justification for slaves to protect the government vanishes.
Ever hear of the Prisoners' Dilemma? People might not want to risk death because the probability that their sacrifice changes the outcome of the war is trivial.
The question answers itself, and I did answer it already. If I am not willing to volunteer, no, I am not willing to be drafted. If I were in favor of slavery for thee but not for me, that would make me a slaver and a hypocrite.
My argument against slavery is that it is unfalsifiable. A slave has no more agency than a dog or a table; otherwise, they wouldn't be a slave. Further, even if slaves were allowed to contest their slavery, it is impossible to prove one is not a slave. Contracts can be forged.
The only possible solution is basing slavery on some immutable physical characteristic, such as ... skin color, and then you run into interbreeding problems. One drop rule? Grandparent rule? All too easy to forge.
The existence of legal slavery turns the default condition of man into slavery. The only free people are those with wealth, power, and pure luck, and there's no guarantee how long that will last.
That's not a principled argument following from self-ownership or anything similar. It's just a pragmatic argument that no legal system can allow slavery.
There's another, possibly more practical, reason. A slave is a tool who does what his owner tells him to, just as hammer or saw is a tool with no free will. The responsibility and accountability lie entirely with the slave owner, not the slave. That is the definition of being a slave, the lack of agency.
If Alice is found murdered with a gun and the gun is traced back to slave Bob, and further evidence shows Bob's owner Carol ordered Bob to murder Alice, Carol is put on trial for murder, not Bob. If I were involuntary slave Bob, my first murder victim would be my owner Alice, and because my owner had taken upon herself all accountability and responsibility, she must have told me to kill her; she committed suicide.
A legal system which recognizes slavery as a valid institution and claims to be consistent has to follow that course. Of course none would. They would execute Bob just as one does a rabid dog. But that would be proof of their inconsistency and proof that slavery is inhumane for forcing unwilling slaves to do things they would never do voluntarily.
The US has stopped conscription for a while, but it's still a very active thing in other allied countries, like Ukraine, South Korea, and Israel. It's worth reflecting on whether the draft in those countries seems immoral.
To me, libertarianism is a matter of degree, and just about the least libertarian situation is if there was a risk that my country would be invaded by an authoritatian neighbor. If I were Ukrainian I really wouldn't want Ukraine to stop the draft if that meant folding to Russia. So this is another case where to me the "axiomatic" case seems much weaker than a "pragmatic" one.
First, you fail to distinguish between government and society. "Country" as you use it means government, not society.
In that existential crisis case, if people won't volunteer to risk death for their government, then they apparently don't think it's an existential crisis, and the justification for slaves to protect the government vanishes.
Ever hear of the Prisoners' Dilemma? People might not want to risk death because the probability that their sacrifice changes the outcome of the war is trivial.
Irrelevant. Nothing to do with slavery, unless you want to change the name to the slaves’ dilemma.
ETA: Stupid comment on my part, thinking from the wrong context.
If you were Ukrainian, would you want them to stop the draft?
The question answers itself, and I did answer it already. If I am not willing to volunteer, no, I am not willing to be drafted. If I were in favor of slavery for thee but not for me, that would make me a slaver and a hypocrite.
In this scenario, I think you're gonna end up drafted anyway, just for the Russian army....
Or you just leave the country, which I'd much prefer to conscription.
Same here, because if a government has to enslave an army to survive, it no longer represents the society I wanted to be part of.