Libertarians say a lot of things that I think most Americans agree with. They are for lower taxes, less government regulation, freedom of speech, etc.
But it seems like any time libertarians have an opportunity to present their views to the public, instead of talking about the things that would win them support, they insist on talking about their most unpopular positions. They either talk about things where it's difficult to see how libertarian policies would work, like private roads and private police forces, or worse, they talk about wildly unpopular positions, like gay rights and legalizing drug abuse.
I've seen so many libertarians go down a rabbit hole about private roads or police forces. How would a totally libertarian, free market road system work? If the only road to your house is owned by a private company, what would stop them from charging you an outrageous toll every time you go home? You could have two roads to every house to create competition, but (a) that would be expensive, and (b) you'd have to tear down many existing houses to make room for all the new roads.
Similarly, how would private police forces work? Who decides what laws they enforce? If I rob your house and your private police force comes to arrest me, what if my private police force blocks them? Would they shoot it out? It seems there's a lot of potential for such private police forces to turn into bandit gangs terrorizing the people and fighting turf wars.
I'm not saying there are no libertarian solutions to these problems. I'm just saying that I can't think of any, and the libertarians I've heard don't have solutions that sound realistic to me.
Similarly on gay rights and legalizing drugs. Most Americans are either against these things or at least are uncomfortable about it. But libertarians will go on and on about these as great goods.
And so, instead of talking about things that would make them friends, they talk about things that make them enemies. Or at least, that make people think they are unrealistic and out of touch.
© 2025 by Jay Johansen
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