this post was submitted on 23 Nov 2024
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[–] TheTechnician27 67 points 3 weeks ago (9 children)

"I'm a fascist and a right-libertarian and pro-union." The only positive takeaway I have from this is that some people are so uninformed (or overinformed but with no ability to think critically) that they make these choices – and thus education and outreach may still yet save us.

[–] Narauko 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Nothing counter indicative with libertarian and union. Unions allow more equal negotiating power with business/capital when government is limited in scope. People should be allowed to decide if they want to unionize for themselves though, without coercion from capital and with protections to be allowed to do so.

Libertarians should also be requesting government do it's job and crush monopolies and enforce the regulations that keep the "free market" both free and level for all participants, and the right-libertarians are mostly actually theocratic feudalists masquerading as libertarian these days.

[–] TheTechnician27 8 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

That's why I specified right-libertarian. I think basically all left-libertarians recognize the need for workers' unions. The problem with right-libertarians here is that they see the union itself and the kinds of government regulation that lets those unions be effective as the entities "treading on" them.

[–] Narauko 1 points 3 weeks ago

In complete agreement, but would point out that for some (maybe many) center- and right-libertarians they see the graft and waste that the post-labor rights boom era as analogous to tyrannical government due to many nuggets of truth. Labor isn't immune to corruption any more than capital is, and capital took massive advantage in demonizing unions because of actual flaws to exaggerate.

Police unions getting bad cops rehired and back on the streets has similar analogs in the biggest labor unions. Public sector unions probably shouldn't exist, and police unions definitely shouldn't, and some people continue that line of thinking into private sector labor unions.

Any organization of a sufficient size will suffer inefficiencies and exploitation, so any union large enough to bargain with a monopoly will end up just as bloated and corruptible. The obvious solution (as I see it) is to break the monopolies into reasonable sizes so the unions are also manageable and accountable, so capital can't use such effective whataboutisms.

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