One objection to a free society that statists frequently grasp at is their claim that without government control ("laws", "taxes"), no one would help others. Or at least, there wouldn't be "enough" help to go around.
This is so ridiculous that it doesn't even need to be addressed, but I will anyway.
I once bought $300 worth of tools for someone I didn't even really know, just so he could get a job. No one forced me to do it.
I have several subscribers to this blog whose monthly subscriptions help me pay the bills. No one holds a gun to their heads to talk them into helping me.
The world is filled with charities-- supported voluntarily-- which help people out in spite of governments robbing people under the pretense of helping those same people. So, people are paying twice for the same thing; once under threat of death, and once just because they care. People still choose to go above and beyond to contribute on top of what they are forced to hand over to the State. Do statists really believe ending "taxation" (and regulation), giving everyone more money, would cause these contributions to dry up? It's what they claim to believe.
Recently, truly generous people helped me afford a vet visit to save my daughter's cat's life. I'm more grateful for that than I can express. They didn't have to help; they chose to.
A few years ago, people chipped in so I could travel to attend my older daughter's funeral. Again, no one made them do it. I'll never forget.
People like to help others. I like to help others.
I still give what I can when I can. If I weren't under continual threat to be robbed by the State I could afford to give more, like I used to back when I had more money to shuffle around. I'm confident others are like me in this regard. Seeing opportunities to help, and not being able to, is one of the saddest things to me about being broke.
If government extremists are so sure ending the extortion racket would end in disaster, let us try it for a year and see how it goes.
If I'm wrong, I'm wrong. Then I suppose you can go back to having your goons rob me at gunpoint.
But if I'm right, and the only things left lacking in funds are those things which shouldn't be done in the first place ("services" no one really wants enough to pay for them if they have a choice), then I want the statists to shut up and go away forever. It's a reasonable deal they are too afraid to take. I suspect they know what would happen.
Excellently put!
ReplyDeleteWith the amount stolen from me each year, I could afford to purchase a second home and allow a needy family to stay there for little to no rent.
When I make the offer to statists, I make it even better. I give them the Obama line: "If you like your government, you can keep it." Just change the system so that only voters pay taxes and the law only applies to voters and how you can treat voters. So the effect would be that a police officer could pull over a voter for speeding, but not a non-voter. The police officer could charge a non-voter with murder / theft, but arbitration would have to be done outside the state. On the flip side, a non-voter could not use the court system, would be charged extra for using the roads, libraries, parks, etc...
I just had another thought. That kind of system would eliminate the statist complaint for low voter turnout (at least in the short term until people realized how little they need from the state).
DeleteI've made the same offer. They object that their system can't work if people are allowed to opt out. I can't argue with that. Their "system" would quickly collapse as soon as people began to see others living a much better way!
Delete(I'm not getting notifications about comments for some reason. And I fiddled with the settings, but still nothing. Grrr.)