[extropy-chat] Robin Hood (was: Bush wants another $75 billion for wars)

[Mike Lorrey]

--- Nicholas Anthony MacDonald <namacdon at ole.augie.edu> wrote:

> Mike Lorrey wrote:
> 
> "The concept of the "Robin Hood" is possibly the most corrosive idea
> in
> western history."
> 
> 
> Ah, I remember reading that in Atlas Shrugged, and thinking- "wait a
> second, Ayn.  'Robin Hood' was stealing wealth that belonged to the
> 'statists' of the time, the feudal lords who held their subjects in a
> condition of slavery or near-slavery, with few, if any real freedoms
> and no chance for upward mobility.  The lords did little to deserve
> their income other than possess horses, armor, and weaponry that the
> commoners lacked- they were just like the dictators of today.  So, by
> that reckoning, who is to say that Robin Hood was doing anything
> wrong at all?  In fact, Robin Hood seems remarkably similiar to the
> rest of the heroes of your dreary novel..."

This illustrates the cognitive dissonance. That what Robin Hood might
have been doing in the setting of a feudal society might have been
considered heroic by those benefitting from his theft is immaterial as
to whether his approach to the opression of the aristocracy was a
properly libertarian approach. What he did is tantamount to 'doing good
by doing bad.'

The Prince John who was the bad guy in the story, you might note, is
also the same guy who became King John who the aristocrats rebelled
against and forced him to sign the Magna Charta, which really began the
end of feudalism because it granted, among other things, what has
become our common law right to travel, to the serfs, so they were no
longer tied to their lords land. The Magna Charta is a libertarian
outcome. Committing theft is not. Learn to distinguish the difference.

=====
Mike Lorrey
Vice-Chair, 2nd District, Libertarian Party of NH
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."
                                      -William Pitt (1759-1806) 
Blog: http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=Sadomikeyism


		
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