Paulo Pilotti Duarte

These right-liberal groups have been organizing since at least 2004/2005. Think tanks receiving money from private companies to write articles and hold “libertarian” meetings have been fighting for over a decade. What happened is that Bolsonaro opened the door for the liberal agenda they preach. In this view, authoritarianism was a collateral issue that they could control through Paulo Guedes and the Supreme Court. It didn't work. Bolsonaro is not the result of a sudden growth of a belligerent ideology that formed as a counterpoint to the left; Bolsonaro and all the authoritarianism sweeping the world (Trump, Boris Johnson, Erdogan, and many others) are a reflection of the exhaustion of the social-democratic model of the 90s/00s, the accumulation of wealth by a few, and in Brazil, the liberal Car Wash campaign led by the media that today is horrified by Bolsonaro (FSP, Globo, Estadão).

The left has always needed to be violent to advance an inch in the pursuit of labor rights. The CLT (Consolidation of Labor Laws) came about through the deaths of many anarcho-syndicalists in general strikes across this country. The SUS (Unified Health System) only came after many poor people died without care or waiting in line at charities like Santa Casa. The “status quo” does not hand over any slice of power and money without a fight, which is why you will usually see workers having to enter direct confrontation with the Military Police (the armed branch of state repression) to receive transportation vouchers and meal allowances on time.

(...)

And this has a name: post-politics.

This type of action ends up strengthening people who feed on the social inequalities of this country (and others) by selling themselves as complete solutions against a symbolic evil. Doria is the prime example of this: the manager who will “end” the problems left by the PT. This common-sense discourse is very affective but not very effective. People will all agree with you if you say that “politicians only think of themselves” because it's more comfortable than thinking that there are alternatives to the current Brazilian sociopolitical system. However, positioning oneself in this way is “extreme” because it challenges the unequal stability that our society has achieved.

Anyway, I think you have a point: ordinary people don't usually embrace causes that can bring them problems (instability) because they have a lot to lose (jobs, income, housing, their own lives) and prefer a life of extreme difficulties but that brings them a minimum stability to at least stay in the same social stratum.

On the other hand, you confuse the political causes and correlations that have brought us to the current moment, creating a false dichotomy between the discourse of the far-left and the Brazilian alt-right. Although the far-left advocates for an armed revolution and a break with the current social structures, it never advocates attacking individual rights such as freedom and the right to life, something that is common in the alt-right, which often reproduces Nazi, racist, and misogynistic aesthetic discourses invoking a supposed “purity” of classical thought (this is Olavo de Carvalho's main point) that would be regained by eliminating the left and its individual values, replacing them with values they deem morally superior (Christianity, TFP, etc.).

(...)

I see that there is a paradox in libertarian ideology when the NAP (Non-Aggression Principle) is preached for everything because, in issues like this, what is the limit of aggression? You can say “just move” in the case of a neighbor with tires breeding dengue mosquitoes. Or, in the current case of masks, just avoid direct contact with those who are without. In both cases, however, there is a humanitarian dilemma.

Despite this, society (as a social body) has already created a solution for this dilemma: the State. It dictates the minimum rules of social coexistence in normal and extraordinary times and has the monopoly of force to enforce them because, theoretically, physical and legal security should be equal. Private property itself depends on the State for its existence. The private, minimal, or non-existent state that the various strands of libertarian/mincap/ancap thought create brings with it various social dilemmas that are only resolved via the State. And for me, this is the problem with all libertarian thought: it starts from a world with a State to imagine a world without a State but using the rules created by that same State.

(...)

One of the big mistakes people make when debating libertarian ethics is thinking that libertarians are against all kinds of governance. Libertarians are only against imposed governance.

This is a statement completely devoid of sense or meaning. All governance is imposed. If you open it up to voting, it is an imposition. If you put it in place by merit (whatever the guideline chosen), it is imposed. Any kind of governance, even if it is a council (as anarchists

• P