I often see statists try to claim that because law enforcement doesn't _immediately_ execute lawbreakers, that there is no threat of violence/death involved.
For example:
"These are valid points, but the "penalty" for not following the regulation itself is not death. Death would be a result of severe noncompliance (or excessive force). It is always a risk."
My response:
Yes, if you choose not the obey, there's typically a ladder of increasingly severe punishment before you're directly threatened with death. Since most people want to live, they obey long before they face death. That doesn't mean that the threat of violent death doesn't exist though.
To illustrate, imagine that a would-be rapist threatens a woman with death unless she obeys his demands to let him have sex with her. Many women will choose to obey rather than risk death, right? But even if woman chooses to comply long before her rapist kills her, the threat of death is what causes her to obey.
And if a woman chooses to fight back with sufficient vigor--up to and including killing her would-be rapist--no one faults her for doing so. That's because almost no one regards the rapist's demands as legitimate.
By contrast, if the same woman kills the sheriff come to collect taxes, the statist sympathizes with the _sheriff_. That's because the statist thinks that the demand to pay taxes is legitimate.
But that doesn't change the fact that both the rapist and the sheriff use threats of violent death to compel obedience.
For example:
"These are valid points, but the "penalty" for not following the regulation itself is not death. Death would be a result of severe noncompliance (or excessive force). It is always a risk."
My response:
Yes, if you choose not the obey, there's typically a ladder of increasingly severe punishment before you're directly threatened with death. Since most people want to live, they obey long before they face death. That doesn't mean that the threat of violent death doesn't exist though.
To illustrate, imagine that a would-be rapist threatens a woman with death unless she obeys his demands to let him have sex with her. Many women will choose to obey rather than risk death, right? But even if woman chooses to comply long before her rapist kills her, the threat of death is what causes her to obey.
And if a woman chooses to fight back with sufficient vigor--up to and including killing her would-be rapist--no one faults her for doing so. That's because almost no one regards the rapist's demands as legitimate.
By contrast, if the same woman kills the sheriff come to collect taxes, the statist sympathizes with the _sheriff_. That's because the statist thinks that the demand to pay taxes is legitimate.
But that doesn't change the fact that both the rapist and the sheriff use threats of violent death to compel obedience.