Author: Patrick Smith Cross Links: Walter Block Mises Institute
Upon reflection, I realize I was overly charitable in my previous defense of Walter Block regarding his expulsion from the Mises Institute. I’m publicly revising my stance, as I wish others would do in similar situations.
In my interview with Walter Block and Alan Futerman which you may find here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jPhKck1W-s
I examined their expulsion from the Mises Institute in depth, along with Hoppes calling them on the carpet. I noted that they wrote the book with their claims that Israel is justified in murdering innocents in Gaza explicitly from a position that neither of them hold, that of a classical liberal.
The classical liberal position is a collectivist one that has within its allowable bounds, notions such as Just War Theory, in which “nations” like Israel are taken as a whole, and are justified in acting with defensive force against other collectives like, say, “Palestine” or “Gaza”.
From these collectivist positions one can certainly build up justifications for the accidental, incidental, or even express murder of innocents in service of winning a “war of self-defense”. I don’t see this as a controversial statement even a little. These justifications are used for just about every war ever.
The outrage came from a well known Anarcho-Capitalist, co-father of the Mises Institute, composing a book containing such justifications.
So in the interview I put that fulcrum point directly to them with statements such as. “You are writing from a position you do not hold.” “It is improper for them to punish you for writing out arguments that you specifically and explicitly disagree with.” In response, I got assent, agreement, and zero push back.
At one point I even called for the Mises Institute to reinstate him due to this seemingly critical misunderstanding.
However:
I’ve not seen him loudly, or even quietly actually, outside my one interview, mention that oh so critical fulcrum of misunderstanding to really drive it home as an affirmative defense.
I’ve not seen him do or say much to justify why he invested the considerable effort of writing an entire book in defense of the positions of collectivistic enemies of anarcho-capitalism.
In my interview he attempted an argument justifying killing a baby being used as a shield.
And now, today, I see him republish an article on his substack claiming that his position is “grounded in libertarian principles of non-aggression and the protection of innocent life”.
In light of all that, I think there is sufficient evidence for me to reverse my defense of Block on this issue. If he agrees that collectivist war theories can be justified in any way whatsoever by libertarian principle, then he has lost the plot. I also feel a little deceived. Was he writing from a classical liberal position that he did not hold or one “grounded in libertarian principles of non-aggression”? Was it clown-nose-on or clown-nose-off?
After this recent publishing on substack, I think I have to concead that this was his actual position. https://walterblock.substack.com/p/exiling-block-what-the-mises-institute?publication_id=997655&post_id=162876132&isFreemail=true&r=4d2esw&triedRedirect=true&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
I can understand writing an argument from a position one does not hold for purposes of steel-manning it for a rebuttal, or even just as a thought experiment. I was dubious about writing it seemingly for no other purpose than to help the collectivists bolster their murderous position. Why do such a thing? I was trying to be charitable by deffering an answer to that question, but I think that may have been too generous.
As it stands now, he wrote a book in defense of collectivist justifications for the murder of innocents, and now published articles saying these positions are justifiable under the non-aggression principle.
I feel like I’ve been had.
I will continue to respect Walter Block’s significant contributions to libertarian thought and appreciate the work I’ve done with him, including producing an audiobook version of his “Defending the Undefendable II”, which you may purchase here: https://amzn.to/3syjYEb
He’s just wrong on this one. He messed up in my opinion; for reasons I’m not aware of.
You Own You Lead Yourself