Some residents of St. Louis, fed up with the nonprotection from the city’s police, have hired private security to deal with the problem. The egalitarian Left, of course, doesn’t like that.

Original Article: "Egalitarianism as a Revolt against Safety"

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There are certain goods and services that egalitarians, as third parties, would prefer that no one enjoys rather than for some to have more than others. (The proviso “as third parties” is necessary since egalitarians will not do without these goods and services themselves, but they still see fit to comment on inequalities from afar.) One of these services is public safety, as shown in a series of articles written by ProPublica reporter Jeremy Kohler complaining about the fact that people in St. Louis can hire private security, rather than about everyone in the city being equally unprotected.
Consider this headline: “St. Louis’ Private Police Forces Make Security a Luxury of the Rich.” That is one way to spin the fact that the supposed engine of providing

Although commonly used, Max Weber’s definition of the state—an entity that has a monopoly on the legitimate use of force within a given geographical area—can mislead people into thinking that the state is the only or even the primary reason for security and order. This is illustrated in the trends in the nonstate provision of security, as revealed by my Google alert for the phrase “private police.” Lately, incidents of car and bike theft have led individuals to either organize themselves to prevent and respond to it or hire private security to do so.
One example is a gas station in Philadelphia (a city that has frequently been in the news lately due to growing crime problems, having set a new personal record for annual murders) that has hired security armed with