[Lnc-business] Email Ballot 2018-03: Censure of Arvin Vohra

Starchild starchild at lp.org
Mon Jan 22 23:30:16 EST 2018


Elizabeth,

	Can you point to where Arvin thinks it's okay for others to be subjected to coercion? I am not aware of any such statements from him. I could be reading him wrong, but my sense is that he was saying a surfeit of empathy can cloud our thinking, not that empathy itself is bad. It is certainly also possible to have a benevolent outlook toward others (i.e. believing they should not be aggressed against) without feeling particularly empathetic toward them. Personally I tend to feel that more empathy is a good thing and favor a more heart-based approach to communicating our message as Caryn Ann articulates, but I don't think making a case against empathy is in itself unlibertarian. It is possible to act according to the tenets of libertarianism without having empathy, just as one can also act according to the tenets of any other political philosophy without having empathy.

	Obviously some libertarians feel that people below a certain fixed age are automatically incapable of consenting to sexual activity, but opinions on what this age is differ, while other libertarians do not feel that consent is age-based at all. I think it is an issue like abortion, where there is honest disagreement about the correct application of the Non-Aggression Principle because it depends on one's beliefs about human development, which is a scientific or even philosophical question. I have yet to see any clear examples of Arvin espousing unlibertarian ideas.

Love & Liberty,

                                  ((( starchild )))
At-Large Representative, Libertarian National Committee
                       RealReform at earthlink.net
                                (415) 625-FREE


On Jan 22, 2018, at 7:29 PM, Elizabeth Van Horn wrote:

> I vote no.
> ----------------
> 
> I might have voted in favor of the original censure motion by Jeff Hewitt. This recent censure motion isn't acceptable to me, as I disagree that Arvin was indeed espousing libertarian ideas.
> My objections are twofold:
> 
> 1)  Libertarianism is not simply caring about ones own freedoms. It is caring about freedom for EVERYONE. Believing that YOU should be free from coercion, and believing that PEOPLE should be free from coercion, are two different ideas. One is selfishness, the other is libertarianism. Arvin's principle does not include concern for the freedom of others, it is primarily concerned with the impact it has on him.  If you are more concerned with money being taken from you than with the safety of children, then your concern isn't about freedom.  It's about yourself.
> 
> Arvin wasn't espousing libertarian ideas. Instead it was a form of ideological brutalism, which is well described by known libertarian anarchist, Jeffrey Tucker. I reject the notion that this is an anarchist stance versus minarchists. Instead it is a brutalization of libertarianism to become an abdication of responsibility.
> 
> 2)  The censure is too little too late.  It's a band-aid for an gaping wound.
> 
> ---
> Elizabeth Van Horn
> LNC Region 3 (IN, MI, OH, KY)
> Secretary Libertarian Party of Madison Co, Indiana
> Chair-LP Social Media Process Review Committee
> Vice-Chair Libertarian Pragmatist Caucus
> http://www.lpcaucus.org/
> 
> 
> On 2018-01-20 22:03, Alicia Mattson wrote:
>> We have an electronic mail ballot.
>>   Votes are due to the LNC-Business list by January 30, 2018 at
>>   11:59:59pm Pacific time.
>>   Co-Sponsors:  Hayes, Hewitt, Demarest, Hagan
>>   Motion:  to censure LNC Vice Chair Arvin Vohra for repeated public
>>   comments which have presented libertarian ideas in an inflammatory and
>>   sometimes offensive manner not conducive to Libertarian leaders and
>>   candidates for public office winning hearts and minds for those ideas.
>>   -Alicia
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