I'm arguing that "government" is "illegitimate" by the fact that it is a fiction
"Legitimate" does not mean "existent" or "true." It means "justified." If things had to be legitimate in order to be true, then gang wars, rape, and suicide bombers wouldn't exist. That would be a lovely world to live in, but unfortunately we don't.
Are you really having such difficulty understanding this or are you just trying to be difficult? If you analyze the sentence, you will see that "gov" is "illegit" BECAUSE it IS a FICTION... As a FICTION, it can NEVER be "legit"... This has absolutely nothing to do with crimes committed by MEN. The crimes that are committed are indeed "legit" as they are actions which most people call "crimes". As such, those actions are LEGITIMATE CRIMES !! Of course the word does not mean "justified" and had never been presented here with that meaning.
What the hell do you define "fiction" as, anyway? For the rest of us in the rational world, it refers to something nonexistent, untrue. And the fact remains that there are loads of things which are illegitimate. Illegitimate things exist. Deal with it. You can't define government out of existence. It's still there, whether you like it or not. Once you learn the actual purpose of scare quotes, you might get around to recognizing that.
Rillion, the State, just like a corporation, is a legal fiction-this is a real term for something that does not actually exist-like Wal-Mart as an entity that can be sued-rather than its managers and owners, or as your "state" charging you with murder. The State, like a corporation, is an artificial construct that offers selective moral(and legal) cover to the individuals who compose it. You cannot shake hands with Wal-Mart, or with Georgia or the US, because both of those things are simply ideas. People act, not ideas.
This is the core of individualism, the realization that only individuals act-anything else is mysticism. and worse, usually it is mysticism used to defend all of those horrible acts that are done by individuals.
Perhaps to better clarify this-the "United States" did not atom bomb Hiroshima, Thomas Ferebee, the bombardier of the Enola Gay looked through a bomb sight and incinerated a city, because he believed it was his duty to....an organization. And people say religion is dangerous.