Thank you for reading this! Payne's book is an interesting one to me.

I'm glad that you also find the ideal of voluntary association appealing. I see markets, the free exchange of goods and services, to be exactly that; voluntary. When people freely trade goods and services with each other for their mutual benefit instead of taking things from each other by force, that is a great thing.

I deplore violence, but I'm not a pacifist. I think there are some legitimate uses of violence. What I am thinking about primarily here is self-defence. When someone uses violence against you, I say that you have the right to respond with violence in return. But only so much violence as is necessary to fend of the attacker, no more.

I do not agree that the idea of property is somehow inherently violent. To the contrary, it is those that violate a person's legitimate property that commit violence against that person. When someone tries to take away something that rightfully belongs to you, it is an aggression against you. And when you are forced to resort to violence try to stop them, you are acting in self-defence.

That the very idea of property is somehow based on force I do not find plausible. If only everyone always respected everybody else's property, no defensive force would ever be needed.

I also disagree with your claim that the state is necessary to enforce property. There are countless private measures that an individual can take to protect his or her stuff from others, ranging from a simple lock on the door to private security guards. Simply put, personal security is a service that can be provided privately on a voluntary basis.

Now, as I have tried to explain elsewhere "capitalism" may mean more than one thing, and I do not have an attachment to the word itself. What I support is, again, voluntary association, and this includes market exchange. If by "capitalism" we mean no more than voluntary economic association, free exchange and free enterprise, then I support it. But I think that you and many others mean something quite different by the word, and I have no problem saying that I am against capitalism if it refers to the kind of system we see today in so called liberal democracies where big business is in cahoots with big government.