The most powerful governments in the world, US / NATO, China and Russia all are holding the world at nuclear gunpoint (and they should all be coloured pitch black).

I'd say that's supports my position, rather than undermines it. — Tzeentch

It doesn't. It supports the tautology that the most violent governments are the most violent governments.

It does not support your view that violence (including coercion) begets violence. That view is directly contradicted by the evidence in that the more coercive governments are not the most violent by any measure.

The most violent governments include highly coercive ones, like Russia, and ones with very low measures of government coercion, like the US.

Smaller government does not less to less violence by any measure.

Where do you get the idea that the US has "very low measures of government coercion"?

Where do you think it gets all those trillions of dollars from? They don't grow on trees you know.

Where do you get the idea that the US has "very low measures of government coercion"? — Tzeentch

Gods! Did you even look at any of the links?

Low taxes, low public expenditure, low public sector, low government per capita rates, laissez faire economics...

Governments with higher levels of coercion than the US are less violent.

Do you understand correlation?

Look at all the violence the United States exports - arms industry, international conflicts, etc.

And the violence it imports and outsources. Much of what is consumed in the United States is made in, for example, China. The gap in your logic should be obvious.

When push comes to shove, the United States also has no problem forcibly making its citizens complicit in overseas genocides in third-world countries.

Is this your idea of a "low coercion" government?

Is this your idea of a "low coercion" government? — Tzeentch

Yes. In the terms of your argument. You are arguing that violence breeds violence. You are including in "violence" the sorts of government coercion involved in taxation, regulation and public sector work.

The evidence shows that those forms of coercion do not lead to more violence by any measure.

Your claim is therefore wrong.

Some forms of violence might beget more violence, but clearly not all forms of violence do.

Government coercion in the form of regulations, taxation, public sector works, etc generally has either no effect at all or, if anything, produces slightly less violence than lower levels of such coercion as typified by somewhere like Norway when compared to the US.

You are arguing that violence breeds violence. You are including in "violence" the sorts of government coercion involved in taxation, regulation and public sector work. — Isaac

I never stated it like that.

My point is that powerful governments (which to exist must apply large amounts of violence) wreak the most destruction on mankind. That some governments apply that violence to their own people, and others apply it to people in other countries, does not change their violent nature.

My point is that powerful governments (which to exist must apply large amounts of violence) wreak the most destruction on mankind. — Tzeentch

Yes. And you've failed to prove, of even demonstrate that argument.

Governments currently have an almost total monopoly on violence. They use this monopoly to commit vast atrocities.

Nothing in that proves that non-governed communities would commit fewer atrocities.

The evidence is they would commit the same or more.

You also argued that, in my well-poisoning example, the people ought not coerce the well-poisoner with threat of violence because "violence begets violence". This is also false. The sort of coercive violence a government commits in imposing laws does not beget more violence. If it did you'd see a correlation between the size of government and the levels of violence. There is no such link. In fact it's moderately the opposite.

The sort of coercive violence a government commits in imposing laws does not beget more violence. If it did you'd see a correlation between the size of government and the levels of violence. There is no such link. In fact it's moderately the opposite. — Isaac

It does. It simply outsources, exports or imports it. That's why, as governments have grown larger and more powerful over the course of history, their propensity for violence has likewise grown. Now we're at the point that every person on Earth is threatened every day of their lives by violence.

The link is clearly there, but you don't like to see it.

You argued that, in my well-poisoning example, the people ought not coerce the well-poisoner with threat of violence because "violence begets violence". — Isaac

You cannot reduce my argument to "violence begets violence".

It feels like you don't quite get what it means that every person on Earth is threatened with the annihilation of themselves and everything they hold dear, every day of their lives, by governments.

as governments have grown larger and more powerful over the course of history, their propensity for violence has likewise grown. — Tzeentch

I've literary cited the evidence to the contrary. If you're going to just keep repeating your position without addressing the opposing evidence then it's pointless discussing the matter.

There is no link between size of government and violence. Larger governments are not more violent. Smaller governments are not less violent. There is no link.

There is no link between size of government and violence. — Isaac

Clearly there is, but you need to get the idea out of your head that the United States is somehow an example of a small government!

It's tendrils span the globe. There's not a larger government in the world.

Clearly there is, but you need to get the idea out of your head that the United States is somehow an example of a small government!

It's tendrils span the globe. There's not a larger government in the world. — Tzeentch

There are many larger governments in terms of spending, taxation, laws, public sectors, and government bodies per capita.

If you want to limit your argument to saying that bigger governments in terms of military and economic influence, are more violent, then I'd agree with you, but you do not.

There are many larger governments in terms of spending, taxation, laws, public sectors, and government bodies per capita. — Isaac

A country can have free citizens at the expense of the rest of the world (the United States), and that doesn't make its violence in any way benign.

In the case of some unassuming country like Norway, it's citizens are free, it's government is "large", yet where is the violence?

It outsources its violence to the United States, and thus is complicit, and is not a "non-violent" nation. Complicit not just in the violence the United States has to carry out to guarantee its safety, but complicit also in the violence the United States has to carry out to put itself in a position where it can do that.

It outsources its violence to the United States, and thus is complicit — Tzeentch

The indices I cited include measures of outsourcing.

Is your claim then, that Norway is more violent than the US?

It seems to me the argument that states are required in order to govern competing interests ought to apply to states themselves, but I’ve rarely seen it pushed that far.

States have been operating in relative anarchy since their beginning, and are the only political organizations allowed to do so. At least on paper, though, states have come to adopt “international law” through voluntary consent and agreement rather than through an authority. The monopoly on violence between states is not centralized in one supreme institution.

By extension, does statism suggest that states, like all political organizations of people, ought to be governed by some authority?