Citizenship - a responsibility? Sounds like a debt the government bestowed upon those born on the territory occupied by them. I didn't choose where to be born and I owe nothing to the filth in power. Fuck that. If anyone's willing to buy my shitty citizenship, or exchange, I'd do so gladly.
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I suppose you can put it like that but it's a bit more complicated. There is history involved too. Suppose you have multiple generations of ancestors who fought and maybe died just to create the concept of citizen? Prior to citizens there were subjects. Is it really better to be a subject?
If you sell your citizenship then where do you go?
I never asked to be born in a specific place (I'd pick better), I never signed anything, I've never taken (or be granted) any money or privilege from "my" govt. So I owe them nothing. If they think me having a piece of paper with their logo on it make me their property, well, I beg to differ. They don't own me and I will die fighting while protecting my freedom rather then bow to the criminals in power.
And I can go wherever I want as long as I can get there.
Have you put this to the test? Have you ever paid a tax (including automatically added tax like VAT) or tried to cross national boarders without a passport?
Would you also agree that the (presumably) relative security you, your family and property enjoy has been given to you by the same accident of your birth and birthplace? In other words, that you have benefited from that chance birth and the work of your compatriots and ancestors?
Yes
Yes
No, you have no idea who I am so you can't really say anything like this about me.
Totally true, that's why I asked, albeit in rhetorical form. Could you expand on why you disagree with the statement?
Not gonna bother, really, I said enough already.
The law says you require a passport.
Who writes laws? A rotten and corrupt bunch of parasites and criminals, simple as that.
The laws exist to be followed no matter who wrote them.
I am willing
1 BTC, mate
While you did not choose where to be born, my point is you could have been born in a place much worse, with a lot less. I suppose you can see citizenship as a debt, but again can you show me how people live who are not either citizens, or enslaved, or prisoners of war?
Most people ultimately are born either into citizenship with the best hope being stability or they are born into strife, civil war, warlords, revolutions every 10-20 years, etc. So if by paying taxes, following laws, and being a good citizen you can avoid the fate of some of these others is it that much of a price to pay?
If there is an alternative, a place for people to live with no taxes, no war, no crime, no citizens, please show me? As far as I know, the best places to live even today require citizenship.
The argument you put forward is quite interesting and worth more discussion. The argument of we do not choose where we are born (we don't choose our nationality) is fundamentally a correct argument. It's just like people do not choose the race they are born into but the consequences of being born into that race are real regardless. That is my counter argument, that to be born a citizen of whatever country you were born into has consequences even if you didn't choose it. Other people will see you a certain way no matter how you see yourself.
Yeah, you have a point, enough to take a look at Rohingya people to know how bad can it be. Still, their distress is caused by states (namely both Myanmar and Bangladesh), not the absence of a state of their own.
You know, human society sucks and it has always been fucked in more than one way. If the only thing we're offered is shit, well, it doesn't mean we have to swallow it and ask for more. World's big. World's changing.
There are lesser-known micro countries without much of the shite you get in "real" states, but they have always been under the radar for the majority.
Do you think mafias, or non-state actors cannot cause problems? Terrorist groups have been known to pursue genocide. If some terrorist group attacks those who are stateless then who will come to their aid? Who will prevent total genocide?
Show me the ideal micro country which you deem better than real states?
Mafias? What do you think govt is if not the dominating mafia organization?
Funded by govts, Americans specifically. Remember Mujaheddin in Afghanistan? USA funded them, along with Al-Quaeda, ISIS and the rest. Those groups would never came to be if not for the govts, who are inherently evil and corrupt.
People themselves, a militia perhaps. A community is not that helpless when it's not suppressed by the state. People have grown fat stupid and complacent under the state, and that was its goal all along. As soon as this poison is removed, society might start evolving for real.
So your counter argument is we can have a legal mafia or an illegal mafia? So either way it's the same mafia just with a different front?
You do realize other governments have funded various terrorist groups and dictators too right? The United States isn't the only government in the world which has agencies that can do this. Once you realize it's not just the United States then you can make the point that governments fund terrorism. But you also have to understand that terrorist groups exist regardless of whether governments fund them.
The KKK existed before the CIA or FBI. The KKK was and is clearly a domestic terrorist organization. It was actually the FBI which helped dismantle the KKK if you look at the history. There is no reason to believe the KKK would not rise again if governments didn't exist to dismantle it or groups like it. What about those neo nazis who want to bring a new holocaust? The only thing preventing them from rising again is government agencies infiltrating their ranks.
How do you feel about governments doing these activities? Are you saying you'd rather see these activities done through the private sector, or are you saying they shouldn't be done at all?
How is a militia any different than a mafia? Think about it. If a group of people decide to form what you call a militia then how will the militia get funded unless by organized crime? If it's crime which funds it rather than taxes how do you separate it conceptually from just another street gang, or mafia, etc?
What would stop this group of armed war lords from doing whatever they want to whoever is less able to defend themselves?