Dismantling social institutions that guarantee rights for minorities = racist. Who is in favor of dismantling social institutions that guarantee rights for minorities? Libertarians.
A = B. B = C. A = C.
If your magazine is nicknamed Reason, we hope that you can agree with the critical usage of logic.
Many will recognize the above construct as the relatively basic critique that progressives have used to label Tea Party / libertarian activists as racists. It’s a fairly straightforward argument if you are able to agree with the premise that the United States economy tends to behave in functionally racist ways. Just take a look at the data to see the problem staring us in the face - persons of color disproportionately experience suppressed wages and higher unemployment while controlling for level of education.
Libertarians don’t like institutions. Generally. “We would be more equal without institutions” is a fair statement to make if you can successfully argue that our society would be more equitable in their absence. We have yet to see such an argument made persuasively. Persuading us is harder when key members of the movement’s leadership, like Ron Paul, have a clearly-defined past of making overtly racist statements in correspondence.
