Failure Is A Feature

One of the biggest bones of contention between libertarians and altruistic is the failure of people.

Altruists cannot abide allowing anyone to fail because that suggests that society has failed and they conflate society with people en masse.

The libertarian accepts that individuals must be allowed to fail because failure is intrinsic to personal improvement and as a consequence for bad judgement.

The libertarian view does have room for a "safety net".  It's generally called insurance and philanthropy. Insurance allows an individual, of their own choice, to secure a backup for when things go FUBAR.  Philanthropy allows individuals to voluntarily support causes and interests in both public and private situations.

Altruism insists that safety nets must be both public and mandatory.  Again, telling individuals that they are subject to society.

Both insurance and philanthropy are important to failure.  Indeed, they exist in anticipation of failure.  Insurance and philanthropy can be participated in without an individual personally caring if another, particular person fails or not.  It might be participated in out of sheer profit interest, or it could be participated in because they truly are concerned about others well-being.  It allows for a multitude of possible motivations to exist and reasons to participate.  Therefore, it allows for a greater spectrum of people to voluntarily participate and create and sustain the bigger, better, safety net.

Altruism demands that all, or as many people as possible must be forced to participate.  They claim this forced participation creates the largest net and that by nature of being largest, is conflated with being best. 

The problems with that are multiple.  First, bigger is never a guarantee to be better.  Second, it ignores the history of human nature in that when people are forced to do something, especially if they don't like it or are actively opposed to it, they not only do not give their best, they will often intentionally and actively work against it and drag their feet.  Certainly not having the effect of having it be the best.

History has shown, so many times it can't be counted anymore, that when people voluntarily choose to participate, they put in anywhere from a generally moderate effort to their maximum effort.  When a person is invested in something, they generally are active to defend it and improve it.  They give their best efforts more often than not.

Failure Is inherent to risk.  Risk is a part of everyday life.  No person lives without risk, potential for failure.  Failure Is a motivator to be more careful, to plan better, to be more considerate in one's actions.  

Failure Is a teacher.  It allows us often to see where plans and designs went wrong and to improve on them.  

Becoming better requires in many, if not most, cases that one fail and learn from that.

Yet and still, altruism thinks itself as the better concept because it appeals to shared or assumed responsibility away from the individual to society.  People, as social animals, tend to look for safety in numbers, even if there may be a greater risk of getting run down in a stampede.

Ultimately,  libertarianism is a philosophy for individuals that accept responsibility for themself because that responsibility comes with autonomy.  Failure Is accepted, expected, and used to achieve success.

Altruism is a philosophy of self sacrifice in the hopes of temporary safety and reduced responsibility for oneself.  Failure Is not an option, it is denied, and ultimately it leads to failure anyway.