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Take any marginalized group. Call it group A. It is almost always the case that there are prominent advocates for group A, who profess (at least at first) to be pushing for equality for group A, but what they really want is special pleading for group A. The libertarian position is that equality is desirable; special pleading is not. The people who advocate for special pleading, once having dropped the pretense of being merely for equality, tend to argue that special pleading is now necessary to compensate for the centuries/millennia of oppression group A have suffered in the past.


I see your viewpoint - but I also think that you're confusing equality for moving the goalposts in some cases.

Take racial disparity in the US for instance, and the history of racial segregation and racist policies in government institutions. How do we address the inequality present in the current system without first addressing the root causes of that inequality; some of which stem from hundreds of years ago?

By your definition, that would seem to be special pleading, but it is not, in reality. It is attempting to address current conditions that were caused by past conditions. Or am I way off base?


Racial segregation and racist policies exist today; consider the state of policing and the criminal justice system in the U.S. as it affects minority communities. It's silly, wasteful and divisive to focus on speculative "root causes which stem from hundreds of years ago" when activists have barely even gotten started on addressing the actual, plainly visible causes and dynamics perpetuating current inequality. Clean your room before you think about changing the world.


That's not assuming good faith. Basically it's equivalent of saying that any complaints about discrimination are always dishonest, which is certainly not the case.


I'm actually more sympathetic than the average libertarian to marginalized groups, because social marginalization itself is a terrible thing and it seems hard to address without some sort of community-oriented focus that goes beyond conventional "libertarian" politics and its focus on mere individual equality.

However, I also thinking most advocacy is falling way short of acheving stronger community ties for marginalized groups. Indeed, a lot of such advocacy is clearly counterproductive, in pushing for "liberal" social atomization and further marginalization.




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