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It always seemed to me to be two kinds of Libertarianism. One is what I refer to as radical libertarianism or radical individualism summed up in the phrase "You can do anything you want as long as you don't hurt someone." The crux is the definition of 'hurt'. Usually the such people refer solely to physical or financial harm, those things that can be seen and measured. They are unwilling to accept that a person can be harmed emotionally or spiritually. They are unwilling to place any value whatsoever on culture or society, unwilling to acknowledge the social dimension of people, unwilling to acknowledge that harm to a person's culture harms the person. This leads to narcissism and hedonism (just to throw a couple of -isms out there) as people are forced to withdraw from society. We lose the small community and become conglomerations of individuals. For a view for hte more traditional libertarianism (actually classic liberalism as it used to be defined by Jefferson, Locke, et.al.), I'd read Hayek's "The Constitution of Liberty".

Admittedly there are those conservatives that believe in big government forcing their agenda on the populace just as there are liberals who believe the same thing. There may be justification in this view, too, but personally I don't accept it. I'd still prefer smaller central government with more autonomous local government controlled by people at the local level. People must also have the liberty to be governed the way the choose instead of a one-size-fits-all government imposed on them.

They are unwilling to accept that a person can be harmed emotionally or spiritually.

The problem isn't unwillingness. The problem is that such a claim is so wide open you can drive a giant planet through it. It's the same muckity muck that every crying liberal proclaims. It just turns into a battle of who will rule over who.

There may be justification in this view, too, but personally I don't accept it. I'd still prefer smaller central government with more autonomous local government controlled by people at the local level. People must also have the liberty to be governed the way the choose instead of a one-size-fits-all government imposed on them.

Amen to that brother. BTW, that was how this govt. was originally set up. Federalism is embodied, I believe in the 9th and 10th amendmendments to the constitution. The founders most assuredly did not want a "one size fits all" type of system. But it has evolved(devolved) to that it seems. We have now an "all powerful" federal government along with an "all powerful" SCOTUS. The SCOTUS has given itself the power to overrule everything and has in effect become an "super legislature". What ever happened to limited government? In the words of Margaret Mitchell it appears to have "Gone With The Wind".

They are unwilling to place any value whatsoever on culture or society, unwilling to acknowledge the social dimension of people, unwilling to acknowledge that harm to a person's culture harms the person. This leads to narcissism and hedonism (just to throw a couple of -isms out there) as people are forced to withdraw from society. We lose the small community and become conglomerations of individuals.

You can't hurt a 'culture'. If people think you're a fool, they just ignore you. If they think what you're saying is worthwhile, they stop, listen, and if they agree will alter their lives of their own volition. Its called the freedom to change through your own free will.

Societies where the collective becomes more important than the individual and the right to use coercive force on those that don't agree are usually called socialist or communist.

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Thomas Jefferson, Letter to James Madison, from Paris, Jan. 30, 1787;

"I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of the government." (Regarding Shay's Rebellion)

unwilling to acknowledge that harm to a person's culture harms the person

Naturally, any rational person is "unwilling to acknowledge" such a vapid and empty notion. A criterion that asserts that (for example) limiting how long people can stay on welfare or overthrowing the Taliban regime after 9/11 (both of which upended preexisting cultures) "harms" people (and is therefore morally suspect) can hardly be taken seriously.