Embora esse comportamento seja repugnante, a recusa em prestar serviços por conta de raça, etnia ou orientação sexual é um exercício de auto-propriedade e da liberdade de não-associação. É um ato não-violento e que não viola os direitos das outras pessoas. Se acreditamos de fato na liberdade de associação, logicamente também devemos aceitar também a liberdade de não-associação. O teste convicção de uma pessoa à liberdade de associação ocorre, como no caso da liberdade de expressão, quando o conteúdo dela é repugnante.

Isso, porém, significa que indivíduos privados não podem pacificamente punir empresas que discriminam injustamente alguns consumidores potenciais?

Não! Eles não apenas podem, mas devem. Boicotes, publicidade negativa, ostracismo e outras medidas não-coercitivas também são partes constituintes da liberdade de associação.

Por que tantas pessoas presumem que o único antídoto para algo ruim — incluindo males que não envolvem o uso da força física — é a ação estatal, que sempre implica ameaças de violência? Será que somos mesmo impotentes para lidar com atos repulsivos — porém não-violentos — a não ser que os políticos ajam em nosso nome?

Como todos devem saber, a assembleia legislativa do estado americano do Arizona passou um projeto de lei — que foi vetado pelo governador — que acrescentaria algumas emendas à Lei de Restauração da Liberdade Religiosa (RFRA; Religious Freedom Restoration Act), que afirma que até mesmo uma lei aparentemente neutra em relalão a questões religiosas não pode ser um “fardo substancial” ao exercício da religião na ausência de um “interesse governamental convincente” e um método menos restritivo de satisfazer tal interesse.

Esse projeto de lei foi incentivado por uma decisão da Suprema Corte do Novo México no caso de um fotógrafo comercial que, por motivos religiosos, se recusou a tirar fotos de uma cerimônia de comprometimento de um casal de mesmo sexo. A corte decidiu que a RFRA não se aplica em casos que envolvem indivíduos privados, isto é, casos em que o governo não é uma parte interessada. Assim, um indivíduo privado ou dono de empresa acusado de violar a proibição da discriminação a determinado grupo em acomodações públicas não pode invocar uma exceção por razões religiosas. (“Acomodações públicas” geralmente se referem a empresas e repartições estatais abertas ao público.) Casos parecidos surgiram em outros locais.

A lei do Arizona estenderia a RFRA para qualquer “indivíduo, associação, parceria, corporação, igreja, assembleia ou instituição religiosa, propriedade, consórcio, fundação ou outra entidade legal”. A legislação foi interpretada como um projeto que permitia a discriminação a gays em acomodações públicas — e provavelmente era, de fato — mas o texto não fazia menção a preferências sexuais ou identidades de gênero. (A legislação o Arizona proíbe a discriminação com base em raça e sexo, mas não orientação sexual.) Como afirmou o New York Times, “Muitos críticos — entre eles líderes empresariais e personagens importantes em ambos os partidos políticos nacionais — alegaram que era uma lei amplamente discriminatória e que permitiria todo tipo de negação de serviço, abrindo as portas para que, por exemplo, um taxista muçulmano se recusasse a pegar uma passageira mulher que estivesse sozinha”.

O que um defensor da liberdade individual, da cooperação social pacífica e da tolerância deveria fazer num caso desses?

Primeiramente, eu perguntaria por que um “interesse governamental convincente” — o que quer que isso seja poderia dar ao governo o direito de impor obrigações, substanciais ou não, ao exercício pacífico da religião de qualquer pessoa. O estado é uma organização de meros mortais que, por um método dúbio ou outro, conseguiram vestir o manto da legitimidade política e forçar a obediência, sob pena de prisão, até daqueles que nunca consentiram a esse sistema absurdo.

A seguir, eu perguntaria por que a religião é a única preocupação considerada. O estado não deveria ser impedido também de impor fardos excessivos sobre o exercício de convicções seculares?

Como escreveu Mario Rizzo, da Universidade de Nova York, no Facebook:

O problema é que a lei identificava apenas um motivo aprovado — o religioso — por que uma pessoa pudesse se recusar a fornecer serviços a outra. O padrão costumava ser a liberdade de associação e contrato a não ser que houvesse uma excelente razão para impedir o exercício dessa liberdade. Agora, aparentemente o padrão é que você deve agir de acordo com os valores “progressistas” ou encarar as consequências. Ninguém no Arizona correria qualquer risco de ficar sem serviços vitais — o ambiente é competitivo e as pessoas querem ganhar dinheiro. É um ambiente diferente do antigo sul. Mas, bom, ninguém tem interesse em distinções sutis a respeito da liberdade.

Quando Rizzo afirma que “[n]inguém no Arizona correria qualquer risco de ficar sem serviços vitais — o ambiente é competitivo e as pessoas querem ganhar dinheiro”, ele se refere ao fato de que, a não ser que a intervenção estatal proteja as empresas discriminatórias (como no sul dos EUA antigamente), o mercado as pune e recompensa estabelecimentos mais inclusivos.

Agora, no momento em que uma pessoa diz que o governo não deveria ter o poder de punir as empresas de discriminarem em acomodações públicas, um interlocutor social-democrata provavelmente perguntará: “Então uma empresa deve poder recusar serviço a uma pessoa só por ela ser gay ou negra?”.

Ao que eu responderia: “Não, a empresa não deveria poder fazer isso. Mas ‘não poder’ para mim significa que nós devemos não-violentamente impor custos sobre aqueles que ofendem a decência ao humilhar pessoas com a recusa do fornecimento de serviços“. Como afirmado acima, isso incluiria boicotes, publicidade e ostracismo. O estado não deve ser visto como antídoto e, dado que sua essência é a violência, ele não deve punir condutas não-violentas, não importa o quão inaceitáveis elas sejam.

As proibições estatais escondem o preconceito, tornando a resposta privada mais difícil. Um casal judeu quereria que um anti-semita fotografasse seu casamento? Um casal gay gostaria que um homofóbico fizesse seu bolo? Além disso, proibições legais podem causar problemas para o lado contrário. Um fotógrafo negro deveria ser obrigado a trabalhar no casamento de um casal supremacista branco? Nesse caso, o trabalho forçado não deveria nos deixar arrepiados?

A intolerância deve ser exposta abertamente, para que seja desprezada e ridicularizada.

Como já escrevi em relação à provisão sobre acomodações públicas da Lei de Direitos Civis de 1964, a ação privada não é apenas moralmente superior à ação governamental, mas é também mais eficiente. Ações governamentais não-violentas

já eram empregadas muito antes do estabelecimento [da Lei de Direitos Civis]. A partir de 1960, protestos passivos e outros confrontos ao estilo Gandhi já dessegregavam as lanchonetes de lojas de departamentos em todo o sul. Nenhuma lei precisou ser aprovada ou repelida. A pressão social — a ridicularização pública dos racistas — funcionava.

Até antes, durante os anos 1950, David beito e Linda Royster Beito relatam em Black Maverick que o empresário T.R.M. Howard liderou um boicote às empresas nacionais de gasolina que forçou seus franqueados a permitirem que os negros usassem os banheiros de que eram barrados há anos.

Às vezes se afirma que a provisão das acomodações públicas foi um remédio eficiente porque afetava todas as empresas em uma só tacada. Mas os movimentos sociais diretos também foram eficientes: grupos inteiros de racistas cederiam de uma vez após uma campanha intensa de protestos passivos. Não havia necessidade de dessegregar uma lanchonete de cada vez

A lei, portanto, foi desnecessária. Mas, além disso, foi prejudicial. As maiores vitórias da liberdade ao longo da história foram alcançadas não por lobby, legislação e litigação — não através de pastas de processos e tratados filosóficos — mas através da luta “popular” direta que marcou as sociedades a partir da Idade Média. [Veja também o livro de Thaddeus Russell, A Renegade History of the United States.] Como dizia um de meus mentores, o que é dado como presente pode ser tirado facilmente, enquanto aquilo que é ganho pela luta contra o poder é mais difícil de se perder.

A campanha social pela igualdade que foi a dessegregação do sul mudou ao chegar em Washington. O foco então deixou de ser o movimento de base e as atenções se voltaram à elite branca que tentava assumir o controle das aspirações populares. […]

Nós nunca saberemos como o movimento teria evoluído — que instituições de auxílio mútuo independente teriam emergido — se esse desvio de foco não tivesse ocorrido.

Em outras palavras,

os libertários não precisam se esconder da pergunta “Os brancos deveriam poder excluir os negros de suas lanchonetes?”. Eles podem responder com orgulho: “Não. Eles não devem poder fazer isso. Eles devem ser impedidos — não pelo estado, que não é confiável, mas por ações sociais não-violentas em prol da igualdade.

A resposta libertária ao preconceito é a organização comunitária.

Traduzido do inglês para o português por Erick Vasconcelos.

While such behavior is repugnant, the refusal to serve someone because of his or her race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation is nevertheless an exercise of self-ownership and freedom of nonassociation. It is both nonviolent and nonviolative of other people’s rights. If we are truly to embrace freedom of association, logically we must also embrace freedom of nonassociation. The test of one’s commitment to freedom of association, like freedom of speech, is whether one sticks by it even when the content repulses.

But does this mean that private individuals may not peacefully sanction businesses that invidiously discriminate against would-be customers?

No! They may, and they should. Boycotts, publicity, ostracism, and other noncoercive measures are also constituents of freedom of association.

So why do many people assume that the only remedy for anything bad — including bads that involve no physical force — is state action, which always entails the threat of violence? Are we really so powerless to deal with repulsive but nonviolent conduct unless politicians act on our behalf?

As everyone knows, the Arizona legislature passed — and now the governor has vetoed — a bill that would have amended the state’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which holds that even a seemingly religiously neutral law may not “substantially burden” the exercise of religion in the absence of a “compelling government interest” and a less-restrictive method of advancing that interest.

SB 1062 (PDF) was reportedly prompted by a New Mexico Supreme Court ruling in the case of a commercial photographer who, apparently on religious grounds, refused to take pictures at a same-sex civil-commitment ceremony. The court held that the state’s RFRA does not apply in cases involving private individuals, that is, cases in which the government is not a party. Thus a private person or business owner accused of violating the prohibition on discrimination against designated protected group in public accommodations cannot invoke a religious exemption. (“Public accommodations” generally refers to businesses and government offices open to the general public.) Similar cases have arisen elsewhere.

The Arizona bill would have extended the RFRA to any “individual, association, partnership, corporation, church, religious assembly or institution, estate, trust, foundation or other legal entity.” This was interpreted as legislation intended to permit anti-gay discrimination in public accommodations — and maybe it was — but the bill made no reference to sexual preference or gender identity. (Arizona law bans discrimination on the basis of race and sex, but not sexual orientation.) As the New York Times noted, “A range of critics — who included business leaders and figures in both national political parties — said it was broadly discriminatory and would have permitted all sorts of denials of service, allowing, say, a Muslim taxi driver to refuse to pick up a woman traveling solo.”

What’s an advocate of individual freedom, peaceful social cooperation, and tolerance to make of all this?

Right off, I’d ask how a “compelling state interest” — whatever that may be — could license  government to impose burdens, substantial or otherwise, on anyone’s peaceful exercise of religion. The state is an organization of mere mortals who, by one dubious method or another, have been allowed to don the mantle of political legitimacy and to command obedience on pain of imprisonment even of those who never consented to the preposterous arrangement.

Next I’d ask why religion is the only consideration to be taken into account. Shouldn’t the state also be restrained from burdening the exercise of secular convictions?

As Mario Rizzo of New York University wrote on Facebook,

The difficulty is that the law singled out an approved reason — religious — why someone could refuse his or her services to another person. The default used to be freedom of association and contract unless there was some very good countervailing reason. Now it seems that the default is you must behave according to “progressive” values or else. No one in Arizona would have been in danger of being deprived of vital services — the environment is competitive and people want to make money. It is totally unlike the old south. But, hey, no one has the interest in subtle distinctions about liberty.

When Rizzo says that “No one in Arizona would have been in danger of being deprived of vital services — the environment is competitive and people want to make money,” he’s referring to the fact that, unless government intervention protects bigoted business interests (as it did in the old South), markets will punish them and reward inclusive establishments.

Now the moment anyone says that government should have no power to prohibit business owners from discriminating in public accommodations, a progressive interlocutor will respond, “So a business should be allowed to refuse service to someone because the person is black or gay?”

To which I would say, No, the business should not be allowed to do that. But by “not be allowed,” I mean that the rest of us should nonviolently impose costs on those who offend decency by humiliating persons by the refusal of service. As noted, this would include boycotts, publicity, and ostracism. The state should not be seen as a remedy, and considering that its essence is violence, it certainly should not punish  nonviolent conduct, however objectionable.

State prohibitions drive bigotry into the shadows, making private response more difficult. Would a Jewish couple want an anti-Semite photographing their wedding? Would a gay couple want a homophobe baking their cake? Moreover, legal prohibitions may cut both ways. Should a black photographer have to work the wedding of a white-supremacist couple? Shouldn’t the thought of forced labor make us squirm?

Let intolerance be exposed to the daylight, where it can be shamed and ridiculed.

As I wrote in connection with the public-accommodations provision (Title II) of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, private action is not only morally superior to government action, it is also more effective. Direct nonviolent social action

had been working several years before Title II was enacted. Beginning in 1960 sit-ins and other Gandhi-style confrontations were desegregating department-store lunch counters throughout the South. No laws had to be passed or repealed. Social pressure — the public shaming of bigots — was working.

Even earlier, during the 1950s, David Beito and Linda Royster Beito report inBlack Maverick, black entrepreneur T.R.M. Howard led a boycott of national gasoline companies that forced their franchisees to allow blacks to use the restrooms from which they had long been barred.

It is sometimes argued that Title II was an efficient remedy because it affected all businesses in one fell swoop. But the social movement was also efficient: whole groups of offenders would relent at one time after an intense sit-in campaign. There was no need to win over one lunch counter at a time.

Title II, in other words, was unnecessary. But worse, it was detrimental. History’s greatest victories for liberty were achieved not through lobbying, legislation, and litigation — not through legal briefs and philosophical treatises — but through the sort of direct “people’s” struggle that marked the Middle Ages and beyond. [See also Thaddeus Russell’s A Renegade History of the United States.] As a mentor of mine says, what is given like a gift can be more easily taken away, while what one secures for oneself by facing down power is less easily lost.

The social campaign for equality that was desegregating the South was transmogrified when it was diverted to Washington. Focus then shifted from the grassroots to a patronizing white political elite in Washington that had scurried to the front of the march and claimed leadership.…

We will never know how the original movement would have evolved — what independent mutual-aid institutions would have emerged — had that diversion not occurred.

In other words,

Libertarians need not shy away from the question, “Do you mean that whites should have been allowed to exclude blacks from their lunch counters?” Libertarians can answer proudly, “No. They should not have been allowed to do that. They should have been stopped — not by the State, which can’t be trusted, but by nonviolent social action on behalf of equality.”

The libertarian answer to bigotry is community organizing.

Translations for this article:

• Portuguese, Nós podemos lutar contra o preconceito sem os políticos.

On September 13th, 2013, C4SS’s student activist network, Students for a Stateless Society (S4SS), published a letter dissociating from the S4SS UGent chapter for violating and activating the third S4SS design principle by using racist language, affirming racist conspiracy theories and even advocating violence as a justified or viable response to said theories in a S4SS identified and organizing forum. The third S4SS design principle states:

3. S4SS spaces are safe and valued spaces. We are dedicated to not only identifying agents of aggression, but dissolving institutions of oppression. [emphasis added]

Around 10 days later, the C4SS and S4SS websites were taken down by “not your typical DMCA letter.” In response, we chose to defend our site — not by a legal fight, but by doubling down on our free speech. Rather than being isolated or intimidated into silence by the legal censorship, we spoke out on social media and our websites. We spoke out about the legal threat against us and we re-published copies of the censored exposé on our other websites (here, here, here, here, here and here). We reached out to anarchist, anti-fascist, and information-freedom activists on the web and called on them to swarm against this censorious abuse of copy-power. And to our immense gratitude, we got a lot of help from the web, including, but not limited to: Jad Davis at the jVerse, and wonderful stories in online media by Jesse Walker at Reason, Mike Masnick at techdirt. The social response to legal intimidation made it clear that bigotry could not count on copy-fascism to protect and hide it. We owe all of you all a great debt of gratitude for what came next.

On September 26th, C4SS, regained access and redirected its domain back to its main site. That afternoon we received an anonymous 100 Bitcoin donation to our “Support the Center in this Fight” wallet – 129pipr12a5UUZ447bLYjx1paRnCXqG5vi. (Needless to say, “Some of us laughed, some cried, some screamed, but we were all in shock, until…”)

Later that evening we received an email from Olivier Janssens, the individual that had retained the lawyer, J.D. Obenberger, to draft and submit the DMCA takedown of the S4SS dissociation letter. In this email he identifies himself as the anonymous Bitcoin donor:

First of all, thanks for accepting my defeat. Lesson learned, for sure.

Even if it doesn’t matter to you, I’ve also learned a whole deal about getting ‘aroused’ by a group of guys and joining in bashing Islam. I have a whole other story to tell about that, but I guess thats for another time.

This escalated so far out of control, not just Streisand-wise, but for everything I stand for (intellectual property being evil is one of them). The choice was to pursue this further in court and fight for pro-censorship copyright, which I couldn’t even begin to imagine doing cause it would kill my principles. I am glad you guys were reasonable enough to accept my apologies. I can’t say this enough. I am grateful for the mature response on your blog.

In regards to the lawyer, I’ve been trying to get him to issue a takedown request all day. It seems this might be a first so I think he’s thinking on how to do it. He says that if I don’t counterfile, the site should go up again within 10 days ‘automatically’. I am still trying to push for him to send a letter asking for an earlier restoration, and will try to get you guys in CC or notify you as soon as it goes out.

As another token of good faith, and to make up for what happened, and to protect you from this in the future, I am going to send you 100 BTC.

That’s the story so far, but before you go C4SS would like to respond to a number points in this email and our reactions to it – so that our Supporters understand where we stand and everything else is crystal clear.

1. We did not accept anyone’s defeat. So long as IP and bigotry still exist as the damage holding back the vibrant social cooperation without aggression, oppression, or centralized authority that we desire, this fight is still very much on.

Does this mean we are pursuing state sanctioned legal action against Janssens, his Copyfascist lawyer or the cowardly Bluehost that thought it safer to pull a longtime customer’s site rather than look twice at a DMCA takedown notice that Mike Masnick said, “On my first read, I wondered if it was fake, because not only is it completely over the top, in it, Obenberger more or less admits that the takedown has little to do with copyright…,” no it does not. We are anarchists. We have other means of solving, resolving and dissolving situations.

Does acting like anarchists and not pursuing state sanctioned legal action count as “accepting defeat?” Again, no it does not.

2. Do we believe that he has “learned a whole deal” about this “group of guys and joining in bashing Islam”? We have no idea, but we like to think the best of people.

Philip K. Dick once apologized for “preaching” that “The devil has a metal face,” when what he finally realized was that “[it] was in fact not a face; it was a mask over a face. … You do not place fierce, cold metal over fierce, cold metal. You place it over soft flesh…”

We do not know if behind Janssens’s “fierce, cold metal” mask of IP and bigotry is another “fierce, cold metal” mask covering some other drive for control or intolerance. We do know that under all masks there is, finally, a human face.

We also know that S4SS UGent is still active, they have not reached out to the rest of the network, nor have they taken steps toward following the S4SS design principles. They have not changed their name signaling their change in status or orientation. They have switched their Facebook group, now, to “private,” they have set up a “like” page, and they are planning events and scheduling speakers, still, titled as a S4SS chapter.

In order to protect the S4SS network and prospective members the dissociation letter, “S4SS’ UGent Not Anarchists (or Comrades),” will remain up as a warning until they decide to render it irrelevant through their actions.

3. Are we reasonable enough to accept his apology? We can only accept an apology for actions done to us – the use of the state to take down our site for almost three full days. We cannot and will not accept an apology from him on behalf of any other group or individual that have been harmed by him, specifically the Muslim community. We have neither the right nor inclination. That is for him to do and for that community to consider. This is his moment of reflection and reconciliation.

We would even be happy to encourage and facilitate a conversation with members of the Muslim community for him, if he so desires. It would be a good learning experience for all of us.

4. Good faith, making up and further protection. We are in the process of making sure our writers get paid for their work and moving our site to a more secure and civil liberty conscious host. After all of that is taken care of we will be actively donating, supporting and promoting, anarchist, anti-racist and solidarity economy projects around the world. So it is true that with this donation we will be “making up” for the damage done and protecting ourselves better for the next fight, but good faith is something that is earned everyday with everyone individually.

We wish him all the best and we will try to help him along his way the best we can. But never mistake our best wishes and noblest intentions for passivity or leniency. We want that world of vibrant social cooperation and we are – teeth bared – ready to fight for it.

“Evil is real like cement. … I thought I hated those guys [Nazis] before I did the research [for The Man in the High Castle]. After I did the research, then I had created for myself an enemy that I would hate the rest of my life. Fascism – wherever it appears, whether it is Germany, United States, Soviet Union or anywhere – fascism, wherever it appears, is the enemy.” –Philip K. Dick

The United States government held Muslim blogger Tarek Mehanna in solitary confinement for years before convicting him and sentencing him to years in prison, merely for expressing opinions online. The U.S. government and their allies regularly use bombs to murder innocents in primarily Muslim countries like Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Yemen. The Holy Land Five are incarcerated by the U.S. government merely for making charitable donations and offering humanitarian aid to suffering Palestinians. The French government bans veils worn by Muslim women. Belgium enforces a similar discriminatory ban.

Anarchists, libertarians, and radicals should stand against these oppressive state policies and the bigotry that fuels them. But under the name “Students for a Stateless Society UGent,” some racists have chosen to enlist anarchism’s name to the cause of racism and violent oppression. Last week the Students for a Stateless Society network made it clear that we will not stand for this kind of bigotry. S4SS UGent are not our comrades, nor are they anarchists. Here is our statement of disassociation from these bigots.