The person who robbed me in uninsured so my safety support representative denied my claim

Source: twitter

  • combat_brandonism [they/them]@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief.

    “Bad news, detective. We got a situation.”

    “What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?”

    “Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.”

    The heroin needle practically fell out of my arm. “What kind of monster would do something like that? Bitcoins are the ultimate currency: virtual, anonymous, stateless. They represent true economic freedom, not subject to arbitrary manipulation by any government. Do we have any leads?”

    “Not yet. But mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down … provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so.”

    “Easy, chief,” I said. “Any rate the market offers is, by definition, fair.”

    He laughed. “That’s why you’re the best I got, Lisowski. Now you get out there and find those bitcoins.”

    “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m on it.”

    I put a quarter in the siren. Ten minutes later, I was on the scene. It was a normal office building, strangled on all sides by public sidewalks. I hopped over them and went inside.

    “Home Depot™ Presents the Police!®” I said, flashing my badge and my gun and a small picture of Ron Paul. “Nobody move unless you want to!” They didn’t.

    “Now, which one of you punks is going to pay me to investigate this crime?” No one spoke up.

    “Come on,” I said. “Don’t you all understand that the protection of private property is the foundation of all personal liberty?”

    It didn’t seem like they did.

    “Seriously, guys. Without a strong economic motivator, I’m just going to stand here and not solve this case. Cash is fine, but I prefer being paid in gold bullion or autographed Penn Jillette posters.”

    Nothing. These people were stonewalling me. It almost seemed like they didn’t care that a fortune in computer money invented to buy drugs was missing.

    I figured I could wait them out. I lit several cigarettes indoors. A pregnant lady coughed, and I told her that secondhand smoke is a myth. Just then, a man in glasses made a break for it.

    “Subway™ Eat Fresh and Freeze, Scumbag!®” I yelled.

    Too late. He was already out the front door. I went after him.

    “Stop right there!” I yelled as I ran. He was faster than me because I always try to avoid stepping on public sidewalks. Our country needs a private-sidewalk voucher system, but, thanks to the incestuous interplay between our corrupt federal government and the public-sidewalk lobby, it will never happen.

    I was losing him. “Listen, I’ll pay you to stop!” I yelled. “What would you consider an appropriate price point for stopping? I’ll offer you a thirteenth of an ounce of gold and a gently worn ‘Bob Barr ‘08’ extra-large long-sleeved men’s T-shirt!”

    He turned. In his hand was a revolver that the Constitution said he had every right to own. He fired at me and missed. I pulled my own gun, put a quarter in it, and fired back. The bullet lodged in a U.S.P.S. mailbox less than a foot from his head. I shot the mailbox again, on purpose.

    “All right, all right!” the man yelled, throwing down his weapon. “I give up, cop! I confess: I took the bitcoins.”

    “Why’d you do it?” I asked, as I slapped a pair of Oikos™ Greek Yogurt Presents Handcuffs® on the guy.

    “Because I was afraid.”

    “Afraid?”

    “Afraid of an economic future free from the pernicious meddling of central bankers,” he said. “I’m a central banker.”

    I wanted to coldcock the guy. Years ago, a central banker killed my partner. Instead, I shook my head.

    “Let this be a message to all your central-banker friends out on the street,” I said. “No matter how many bitcoins you steal, you’ll never take away the dream of an open society based on the principles of personal and economic freedom.”

    He nodded, because he knew I was right. Then he swiped his credit card to pay me for arresting him.

  • context [fae/faer, fae/faer]@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    90% of the economy of ancapistan is dedicated to lawyers, pr firms, arbiters, mediators, private militaries, and an army of actuaries endlessly calculating the risks associated with enforcing a particular property claim vs. the odds of winning a dispute with the client’s estate claimants? pretenders? usurpers? after denying their security coverage because enforcement is the expensive part and anyway i’m pretty sure this whole scheme just recreates the genocidal incentive structures inherent to settler-colonialism

    • dumpster_dove [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      10 months ago

      And reputation is this nearly omnipotent force in their world, where a court being biased would immediately make them lose all their power somehow.

    • SacredExcrement [any, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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      10 months ago

      anyway i’m pretty sure this whole scheme just recreates the genocidal incentive structures inherent to settler-colonialism

      It does, while also atomizing it to an individual level

      Truly deranged that people actually think like this

  • FuckyWucky [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    Private court huh? There is the state.

    A court merely gives a judgement, there needs to be something to enforce the same. Who will that be? And what if the corps use their own protection rackets and go corpo wars. Epic cyberpunk chungus

    • edge [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      10 months ago

      there needs to be something to enforce the same. Who will that be?

      Whatever this is supposed to mean. I guess they comply to keep reputation with other businesses and because they’re ideologically committed or something?

      Ring stands down and allows ADT to impose the punishment, due to the mandate from Its backup contract partners and the discipline of constant dealings.

      It literally just sounds like a parody of ancaps. Like the libertarian cop story.

    • somename [she/her]@hexbear.net
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      10 months ago

      Hey, there’s a third option. All the security forces form a cartel and collaborate in whatever way profits them the most, and in no way actually aiding their subscribers in a meaningful way.

    • homhom9000 [she/her]@hexbear.netOP
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      10 months ago

      Actually the private courts will have their own representative company that will be the enforcer. They first have to settle with the opposing sides enforcer to make sure they can get justice. If the enforcer doesn’t agree, the enforcer is covered by the agreement bureau who will work on creating agreement terms with the opposing sides agreement bureau, if that doesn’t go through the agreement bureau has their own term enforcer who-

    • VILenin [he/him]@hexbear.netM
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      10 months ago

      Instead of having a centralized justice apparatus, the private courts will simply pay private cops to send you to private prisons, that contract their work out to private guards. Simple and efficient.

    • Omgboom@lemmy.zip
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      A court merely gives a judgement, there needs to be something to enforce the same. Who will that be?

      The EULA obviously

  • VILenin [he/him]@hexbear.netM
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    Literally just recreating the government, but fracturing it into a million different private entities that you have to separately subscribe to, rendering getting anything done completely impossible. The total yearly subscription costs you pay to simulate the government now exceed the lifetime taxes you would’ve paid under an actual state

  • SerLava [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    Ohh!! Ohh!! Let me get Sam Seder in here.

    Ok pause it. I own ADT and I’m not appreciating how often Amazing Adjucation rules against my customers- it’s killing my market share, the customers are all running to my competitors, who are all advertising double digit higher win rates compared to ADT, because they paid off their adjudicators. I’m a lot bigger than Ring and if Amazing Adjucation loses our contract they’ll probably go out of business. Sure this might encourage my customers to steal more, but so what? The more wealth they have, the more I get to charge to insure it. So I’m going to let Amazing Adjucation know they have an ultimatum, and if Ring and Ring customers don’t like it, they can deal with my much larger mercenary company. Sure we can’t go after Amazon and their customers, because they have the nuclear arsenal, but most other people are fair game- we’ll almost always rule in favor of ourselves.

    At this point, ADT is essentially a piracy conglomeration. Is that your utopia?

  • came_apart_at_Kmart [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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    did this remind anyone else of that hilarious story about the hotel in Laguna last summer? when 20 armed thumbskulls got into a melee trying to arrest each other for trespassing. the city had to shut it all down and issue a restraining order against any of them carrying firearms.

    Hotel Laguna reopens after clash between rival security guards
    Faceoff stems from dispute between local operator-developer and investment group

    Laguna Beach police officers were called to the Hotel Laguna at 425 South Coast Highway last week for a 20-person physical altercation in the lobby between armed guards from two private security firms.

    can you imagine being on vacation, walking around the touristy beach town with your family, drinking your Jamba Juice or w/e and seeing 20 ARMED rent-a-pigs in various uniforms getting into a fight while trying to arrest each other?

    i would be far too enchanted by the spectacle to look away and end up catching a stray in my bathing suit area.

  • Great_Leader_Is_Dead@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    Why would anyone find this convoluted social order desirable in any way? Any time I’m a victim of a petty crime I have to get an arbitrator to prevent corporate warfare over my insurance payout? Feudalism sounds more orderly.

    • Formerlyfarman [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      10 months ago

      Because in such a system the uninsured are esentialy outiside the law. Sociopaths can do whatever they want to them. Then again in medieval times there were waifs and exiles…

    • zifnab25 [he/him, any]@hexbear.net
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      Why would anyone find this convoluted social order desirable in any way?

      Because it implies a bunch of value added labor - investigations, peaceful civil arbitrations, equitable adjudications, amicable and fruitful conflict resolutions - that don’t exist in the real world but seemingly should if liberal theories of social order are accepted.

      It’s a fairytale of civil justice, told by babies to babies, to soothe their own anxieties about the civil nature of the modern world.

      Any time I’m a victim of a petty crime I have to get an arbitrator to prevent corporate warfare over my insurance payout?

      You make a single phone call and everything sorts itself out.

      Absolutely Utopian.

    • Raebxeh@hexbear.net
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      Feudalism sounds more orderly

      That’s because feudalism was at least centralized so you don’t incur all the social penalties involved with distributed human networks. Feudalism is to this what monopolies are to free markets: a centralization of communication patterns.

  • MiraculousMM [he/him, any]@hexbear.netM
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    10 months ago

    I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief.

    “Bad news, detective. We got a situation.”

    “What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?”

    “Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.”

    The heroin needle practically fell out of my arm. “What kind of monster would do something like that? Bitcoins are the ultimate currency: virtual, anonymous, stateless. They represent true economic freedom, not subject to arbitrary manipulation by any government. Do we have any leads?”

    “Not yet. But mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down … provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so.”

    “Easy, chief,” I said. “Any rate the market offers is, by definition, fair.”

    He laughed. “That’s why you’re the best I got, Lisowski. Now you get out there and find those bitcoins.”

    “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m on it.”

    I put a quarter in the siren. Ten minutes later, I was on the scene. It was a normal office building, strangled on all sides by public sidewalks. I hopped over them and went inside.

    “Home Depot™ Presents the Police!®” I said, flashing my badge and my gun and a small picture of Ron Paul. “Nobody move unless you want to!” They didn’t.

    “Now, which one of you punks is going to pay me to investigate this crime?” No one spoke up.

    “Come on,” I said. “Don’t you all understand that the protection of private property is the foundation of all personal liberty?”

    It didn’t seem like they did.

    “Seriously, guys. Without a strong economic motivator, I’m just going to stand here and not solve this case. Cash is fine, but I prefer being paid in gold bullion or autographed Penn Jillette posters.”

    Nothing. These people were stonewalling me. It almost seemed like they didn’t care that a fortune in computer money invented to buy drugs was missing.

    I figured I could wait them out. I lit several cigarettes indoors. A pregnant lady coughed, and I told her that secondhand smoke is a myth. Just then, a man in glasses made a break for it.

    “Subway™ Eat Fresh and Freeze, Scumbag!®” I yelled.

    Too late. He was already out the front door. I went after him.

    “Stop right there!” I yelled as I ran. He was faster than me because I always try to avoid stepping on public sidewalks. Our country needs a private-sidewalk voucher system, but, thanks to the incestuous interplay between our corrupt federal government and the public-sidewalk lobby, it will never happen.

    I was losing him. “Listen, I’ll pay you to stop!” I yelled. “What would you consider an appropriate price point for stopping? I’ll offer you a thirteenth of an ounce of gold and a gently worn ‘Bob Barr ‘08’ extra-large long-sleeved men’s T-shirt!”

    He turned. In his hand was a revolver that the Constitution said he had every right to own. He fired at me and missed. I pulled my own gun, put a quarter in it, and fired back. The bullet lodged in a U.S.P.S. mailbox less than a foot from his head. I shot the mailbox again, on purpose.

    “All right, all right!” the man yelled, throwing down his weapon. “I give up, cop! I confess: I took the bitcoins.”

    “Why’d you do it?” I asked, as I slapped a pair of Oikos™ Greek Yogurt Presents Handcuffs® on the guy.

    “Because I was afraid.”

    “Afraid?”

    “Afraid of an economic future free from the pernicious meddling of central bankers,” he said. “I’m a central banker.”

    I wanted to coldcock the guy. Years ago, a central banker killed my partner. Instead, I shook my head.

    “Let this be a message to all your central-banker friends out on the street,” I said. “No matter how many bitcoins you steal, you’ll never take away the dream of an open society based on the principles of personal and economic freedom.”

    He nodded, because he knew I was right. Then he swiped his credit card to pay me for arresting him.

  • SoyViking [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    10 months ago

    Libertarian theory: Imagine a perfectly spherical contract in a frictionless vacuum…

    Libertarian praxis: Our town got overrun by bears because we couldn’t organise bin collection.

    • CarmineCatboy2 [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      Yeah. Why would both warlords subscribe to the same sage lord to arbitrate disputes? Amazing Adjudication is, for all intents and purposes, the governing body that regulates everything else and appears to have a monopoly in the space portrayed.

      • axont [she/her, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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        10 months ago

        My favorite part of this whole thing is the libertarian assumes the only two options between two competing private security companies are either war or third party arbitration. What’s more likely is they’d both get nothing done and fleece their subscribers for money, do nothing, then get bought out by a much larger private security company that disregards the problem entirely.