Bigoted Libertarians

If that title triggered you, let me make clear from the start that libertarianism is not inherently bigoted and that most libertarians aren't bigoted; many libertarians in fact despise intolerance. What's also true however, is that the ideology attracts bigots who see the freedom-obsessed ideology as a way to protect their "right to discriminate" or their "right of intolerance".

It is not surprising that racists in America are predominantly found among the Republican conservatives, the party that's mostly made up of white males who, as the word "conservative" indicates, want to conserve their perception of American culture, which they identify as "Anglo Saxon" or "Judaeo Christian", both rooted in white European demographics. A 2014 Pew poll found that one in ten Americans identify as libertarian, and men were more than twice as likely to be libertarians. It follows both intuitively and statistically that white men have most to gain by protecting the current status quo in which white men predominantly hold positions of power, and that they use that power to guard against change, especially change from outside their treasured culture.

As with libertarians, not all conservatives are racist, but racists find a home in conservative political parties. The title of this post mentions libertarians specifically because they are even more dominantly white and male; in a 2013 Pew poll 68 percent of Americans who identify as libertarians are men, and 94 percent are non-Hispanic whites, while "steadfast conservatives" were found to be 59 percent male and 87 percent white. You can add to all this that libertarianism is inherently opposed to any collective movements, and that it were collective movements that have long fought for equal rights for women, workers and minorities...

Here's what 2016 libertarian presidential hopeful Rand Paul wrote back in 1982:

“[E]very piece of anti-discrimination legislation passed over the past few decades, ignores one of the basic, inalienable rights of man — the right to discriminate. [Though] eliminating racial and sexual prejudice [had] noble aspiration, [anti-discrimination laws] necessarily utilize the ignoble means of coercive force.”
_{source: Salon}

Most libertarians aren't anarchists but "minarchists"; they don't believe government should be abolished entirely, rather that government should be as small as humanly possible, and should only protect the borders, individual freedoms and private property. Minarcho-capitalists, anyone? Whatever the case, this mix of libertarianism and conservatism, where libertarianism is used as an excuse for a "right of intolerance", and conservatism is the longing white male patriarchal times, serves as a fertile breeding ground for the neo-fascist movements that are part of Donald Trump's supporter base. You know, the white supremacists he refuses to denounce or condemn. What you'll see in the below linked video isn't pretty. It's a report of a private Proud Boys rally recently held in Portland where you can see and hear how members of this violent organization hold extreme conservative and libertarian ideas. Fortunately it also has HasanAbi's sensible left wing commentary to go with it. If, for some reason, you want to watch the report without commentary, that's right here...

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