Non-Ancap Fails to Pretend to be Ancap

Which is a good thing, really. The adult can successfully pretend to be a child but the child can't pretend to be an adult. If anyone succeeded at pretending, it would reveal the immaturity of Ancap thought.

David Grant repeatedly asserts that ancaps believe things which no competent ancap believes. 

But then people start rebuilding the old state institutions: the people living in Auburn form a corporation called “the City of Auburn,”

Yes, probably.

and it is located within territory controlled by another corporation—“the state of Alabama”

No, not likely.

So why did we bother abolishing the state?

But the point of ancap is we don't know. The point is to ask Gnon what he thinks about Alabama. Would Alabama reform, were it necessary to convince Alabamans to join it? Is Alabama in fact a net gain, or a net cost, to the residents of Alabama?
If Alabama costs the residents without giving them much in return, what's the point? Who is being served by Alabama's existence?

Let’s suppose that the preppers didn’t swear an oath, or at least didn’t make their kids do it when they grew up.

"Let's suppose Ancapistan isn't Ancapistan. What follows?" It follows that I don't care? "Let's imagine Catholicism with no Pope."  Okay, but like half the point is to have a Pope.

Does reliance on tacit consent transform the Free Town of Ancapistan into the People’s Republic of Prepperville?

We can suppose Catholics would believe exactly what they believe right now if they had no Pope. It's certainly a possible outcome. It's unlikely.
We don't know how a town would evolve if, to impose its norms on someone, they had to first agree to allow those norms to be imposed. This is one reason no good Ancap advocates freeing an entire nation at once. We believe it would be better, but we also believe there are an endless variety of kinks to be worked out.

Is the divide between state and non-state merely that in one you raise your right hand and say some words when you turn 18?

Yes. And why is that? It is because not everyone will say the words.
Further,

the choice of swearing the same oath as the founders or being exiled from the community.

this may be the consequence, or not. The market is smarter than me, it may come up with a better solution. I consider it overwhelmingly likely that someone will think of a better way of doing this. The Amish have to since their culture is so different, even tiny amount of outside contact with former insiders is likely to significantly change them for the worse. With less drastic differences, full ostracism may not be necessary.

Consider foreign university students. Their tuition isn't subsidized and thus they have to pay the government's share too. This makes it 3-4 times as expensive, but it does not prevent them from coming.

In Ancapistan, an outlaw is responsible for their own security and contract enforcement. This is expensive, but not impossible. Certainly many may refuse to deal with them, as the risks outweigh the costs. This doesn't mean they have to be forcibly booted from the town, though that is within the town baron's rights.

The upside of allowing outlaws to stay is it's much easier to convert them. Further, it allows close contact with Gnon's discipline. A bad town will accumulate many outlaws, creating pressure to reform, or, in the worst case, a competing co-geographical municipality.

Ancapistan and Nozickville each control a certain territory by dint of original appropriation, but this isn’t all the land they use.

"What if Ancapistan and Nozickville are bad at anarchy?" Well, then they learn better or suffer Gnon's wrath.

Property is obtained through securing it. If they use resources they have not secured, then they need to be prepared for it to be secured by someone else and thus lose the use of it.

Fortunately, the Ancapistanis and Nozickvillers reach an agreement on hunting rights, stipulating that the forest will be reserved for hunting, that hunters from both towns will be permitted to hunt there, and that the number of deer each town may hunt will be limited in order to maintain the deer population.

Directly contrary to Ancap principles. Collective ownership don't real. This is like two neighbours, instead of agreeing on a single property line, decide to set up a neutral zone they can both use to a limited degree. I dunno about you, but I'm seeing more conflict arise, not less. Why even bother with the complexity? Half the forest is Nozick's, half is Capistan's.

Tragedy of the commons: it is in each town's benefit to hunt as much of the limit as possible before the other town can.

This sounds like a fine exemplum

As above, it isn't.

Now an anarcho-capitalist would here claim that the two parties would not go to war but instead seek arbitration by a third party.

Secure your property. Don't whine if someone uses unsecured resources you wanted. If someone assaults your security, it is an act of war and you're entitled to defend yourself.

Arbitration might be cheaper, but war is more certain.

Peace is not kind of cheaper, like a different brand of soap. Peace is hundreds of times cheaper.  At 100:1, arbitration can be 99% certain to end unfavourably and you still break even.
Further, because of free Exit, if you try going to war over something stupid like that, your soldiers are likely to Exit rather than actually fight for you. Arbitration is looking hardly more certain.

As we're no longer in a democracy, human relationships might actually exist. It isn't just dollar and cents - the mayor/baron is going to personally know some of his soldiers. "Do I want to risk Frank's life over some trees?" Indeed the mayor/baron is going to have to know some of them personally, or he won't be able to get any loyalty - they won't fight for him even for good reasons.

If you can't get slaves to fight for you, fighting happens way less and nobody even contemplates total war.

On the other side, Rothbardia is going to be thinking the same thing. Judges and courts first arose in England from this exact process. The judges had no power, except Gnon's power to mete out punishments to anyone stupid enough to put the issue to the test of arms. Courts thrived, as we can see.

The only other defense by the anarcho-capitalist would be to say that Rothbardia is in the right—property rights cannot be established merely by convention but only by original appropriation

You know, I don't even know what 'original appropriation' means exactly.
While we can hope Ancap ideas about aggression could hold moral authority and thus skew the field of arms, we cannot rely on it. History shows only hard-nosed rationality is stable. You secure your property not because it gives you some moral authority to use it (though it does) but because 'securing' means 'make it unreasonably expensive to take it from you.'

Convention-based property rights are extremely useful for managing resources that are consumed when they are appropriated.

Security.

You own the deer that you kill through original appropriation, but you only own the wild herd through convention.

Fuck convention, get security.
That said, certain conventions indeed make it more expensive, and thus count as a weak kind of security. As household neighbours we build fences because they work better than convention. It only becomes more important at town-scale.

Fetishizing consent is a distraction.

Sophism.

You obtain fifty dollars from me.
I consented: it was a trade or gift.
I did not consent: it was theft, and I'll be asking for that back, using a glock.

Consent is critical. Consent is one of the foundational pillars of civilization. To ignore consent is to ignore property, which is to undermine order. Without order there will be nothing worth considering the consent status of.

Ancap is perhaps simply the realizing that if consent matters in petty issues between individuals, it only matters more and more as the conflicts get bigger and more significant.

either it must accept that its own system can produce conflicts in which both parties have justification or it must deny the validity of convention-based property rights.

If convention counts as security, then no. If not, then of course one rightly ignores convention.

The state is not the only social evil, nor is it always and invariably the worst social evil.

Gnon knows that many social evils are indirectly caused by the state. Perhaps half? I would like to ask him which ones, exactly.

One of the major ones is religious coercion. When the state supports a religion, it corrupts both. Every religion supported by a state has died or is dying. Every state that forced a religion to support it has become a progressive-style theocracy.

The thirty year's war taught people like Dawkins to say 'religion causes war.' Dawkins is an idiot outside biology.
Because children adopt whatever religion is put to them, when the state controls religion, opposing religions face annihilation and will fight commensurately. It is accepting the false legitimacy of religious coercion that causes such total wars.
Though, as always, secure your religion. Don't expect moral legitimacy to do all the work.

 An anarcho-capitalist believes that if the proper forms are filled out and filed correctly, all solvable social problems will solve themselves.

Other way around. The proper forms, in the sense of formalities, are defined by the state of society in which all solvable social problems are solved.

The road from anarcho-capitalism to neoreaction is paved with the realization that the Cathedral and Leftist entryism are even graver threats than the state.

Without a coercive state there is nothing for the Cathedral to seize, nothing for the Leftist to enter. This is one of those problems that Ancapistan doesn't even need to solve, the transition makes it go away on its own.


You may notice that entryist'ed organizations tend to die on the vine. Most recently reddit almost died from such a takeover attempt. It is only with a state, which can force the customers to stay, that entryism is viable.