Liberty dangerous, but essential to life

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for January 28, 2024)

Like Thomas Jefferson, "I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it."

I also know there can be no such thing as "too much liberty" since liberty-- freedom tempered with responsibility-- is self-regulating. Jefferson knew this, too, since he was smarter than me, but he may have been trying to get his point across to someone less aware.

There are also people who are scared of liberty.

Liberty is messy. It’s not as tightly structured as authoritarianism. Liberty is water; authoritarianism is a  crystal of potassium cyanide. Both can be dangerous, but only one is essential for life.

I'm a libertarian; I recognize that no human being has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human, nor to advocate or delegate its initiation..What does this mean?

"Initiate force" means to throw the first punch; to attack someone who isn't harming your life, liberty, or property. Nor does anyone have the right to hire someone, such as a politician or a legislation enforcer, to do this on their behalf. This is 'delegating" the initiation of force.

This is what "libertarian" means when stripped of all the political frippery.  It's an easy concept; even most children get it.

It is also a promise of what to expect from me. In the unlikely event I violate my principles and throw the first punch in the absence of a credible threat, it's with the realization that I am doing something I have no right to do; something wrong. I would owe restitution.

I have difficulty imagining such a situation, but I suppose anything is possible.

My view comes down to this: I believe in maximum liberty. Since there is no "but" qualifying my stance, this means I am also an anarchist. I do not believe in the legitimacy of any form of government which is imposed on anyone. You have a right to govern yourself, but no one else. Not as an individual, not as part of the majority, and not by delegating someone else. You can't establish or support a government without initiating force.

This puts me at odds with political Libertarians who have a big "But". I've heard from plenty of them about this exact issue. They can do what they want, but they have more in common with Democrats and Republicans than with me.

-

Liberty is the greater good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this

If someone isn't an anarchist

If someone isn't an anarchist it tells me one of three things is probably true about them.

They don't know what anarchism is, having fallen for the statist lie crafted to fool people into hating or fearing anarchism...

They want to continue having power over you, to control what they'll allow you to do...

Or, they hope to have power over you when the tables turn.

So, it's a sign they are either ignorant or evil.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help out.

Statists are experts

One thing statists are really good at, I have noticed, is justifying evil. They'll usually say they are being pragmatic or "realistic".

You need to murder a million people in some country that you don't care about, to maybe save a government you work for? Tell people there's no other way. Tell them it actually saves lives in the long run. Tell them it's the only way to save their life and the lives of those they care about. 

Divert that trolley into the people you are willing to sacrifice for the "greater good". A "greater good" which isn't good, and isn't great, unless you mean in size. A gigantic evil.

Statists are experts at justifying evil because they get so much practice. It's the only way to justify political government, so it's something they must do all the time.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

A little childlike openness would benefit us all

Yesterday I was out and about, and in one business there was a woman with a little girl, about 5 years old, in tow at the register. The little girl was staring at me. I noticed and looked her way, at which point she waved excitedly at me. I waved back and she was so thrilled when I did that she started jumping up and down, yanking on her mom’s jacket. 

Years ago I had a friend whose son, who was around 4 or 5 at the time, would get so excited every time he’d see me that he’d start yelling “My cowboy!” and run to me to show me the toy he was carrying or tell me some important news. 

That sort of thing has been common.

I’ve never been a “kid person”, but they have always been drawn to me anyway. Often when I didn’t think I had the time or inclination to engage with them. 

People have told me that it may be because I don’t talk down to kids. And I’m willing to do things like show them how I make fires without a lighter, pick apart owl pellets to find bones, or look at bugs under a magnifying glass. Things they aren’t normally exposed to by “normal” adults.

The same things that catch the interest of kids have often made adults unable to connect with me. Or so it seems. 

In my experience most adults would rather talk about their team— sportsball or politics. Things I can’t really discuss intelligently (by their standards), and which quickly bore me anyway.

However, that sometimes changes when a kid’s parent sees whatever I’m showing their child through their child’s eyes. Suddenly they are open to something they wouldn’t have been open to before. I’ve made friends this way, when I probably wouldn’t have been able to get to know the parent otherwise.

And, even in other cases, I hope I’ve made some positive impact on the kid. Maybe given them a spark of curiosity they wouldn’t have had otherwise.

Or, even just brightened their day because an adult took notice and waved back.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

The domestic threat

It's true in every country around the world. It's especially true in America: Government is the biggest domestic threat. Yet, government is a foreign power. 

The US government is not American-- even if (bad) Americans are the majority of its workforce. It is an occupying force with interests not aligned with the life, liberty, or property of ordinary Americans.

If Chinese saboteurs replaced every government employee, you probably wouldn't see much difference-- it would still be a foreign power being the biggest domestic threat to America. 

Except that none of your neighbors would care if you defended yourself-- your life and your liberty-- and your property from the replacements. 

The amount of theft, kidnapping, and general archating might even go down because the veil of legitimacy would be gone. There would be nothing for the crooks to hide behind. It's hard to see a downside.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

Cops vs good people

I am a better person than >95% of police officers, and I'm betting you are, too. 

Depending on how ethical you believe working for the state is. I believe it’s completely unethical, but that’s a discussion we’ve had many times before.

Police departments don't even want good people. Or smart people. 

Good people won't enforce counterfeit "laws", and smart people know when a "law" is counterfeit, and are less likely to obey bad orders. Smart people are also less likely to stick with the job of legislation enforcement, which is why police departments won't hire people with IQs above a certain level (room temperature?). That's not the raw material they want in a recruit. No, they want shining examples like Acorn Cop.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

Don't submit to crime of 'gun control'

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for January 21, 2024)

Most politicians remind me of bungling bank robbers who get foiled in their clownish attempts to rob a bank. Rather than being sorry or changing their ways, they decide they'll rob two banks tomorrow.

Instead of robbing banks, though, they keep committing the greater crime of "gun control".

New Mexico's governor Michelle Lujan Grisham seems to want to be on the Most Wanted list for gun law criminals, right up there with the worst dictators in history.

On one hand, how embarrassing for anyone to support such a politician! On the other hand, I prefer when people tell you who they are and what they are plotting to do to you. It's why freedom of speech is non-negotiable. Leave bad people free to incriminate themselves. It's better than a sneak attack by someone you thought was a decent person.

The stack of anti-gun rules perpetually on the agenda-- dishonestly labeled "gun safety laws" today-- always makes things worse. People who won't hesitate to murder anyone who stands in their way aren't going to let another slew of silly laws stop them. Believing it would make a positive difference is a political hallucination which tells more about the believer's mind than about the real world.

People understand this until it comes to politics, then they shut off their brains and parrot the party line.

What about "crime" and "gun violence"?

Crime's solution is known: don't get in the way of anyone trying to defend themselves from those violating their life, liberty, or property. Anything else helps the criminals.

"Gun violence" is a lie; a false distinction crafted by political criminals for the purpose of enslaving you. If they can use manufactured fear to control you-- to rob you of your self-ownership-- that's what they'll do. It's not somehow worse to be harmed by a bad guy using a gun than by a bad guy using a fist, a brick, a car, or a law. Only a political liar would want you to believe otherwise.

No one ever calls for you to be disarmed (or inadequately armed) for your benefit. If you believe their lies to the contrary, you've given yourself over to the enemy. The only reason anyone wants you disarmed is so they can do things to you which you wouldn't allow if you were armed. It's your warning a crime is being planned, and you're the intended victim. Don't go along.

-

Liberty is the greater good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this

Climate assumptions and manipulation

I hear it more and more these days: “As weather threats intensify”, “as the weather gets more extreme”, “as climate change causes more disruption", etc. 

I don’t see intensifying threats, more extreme weather, or more disruption. Do you?

Which of us is most likely to be hallucinating, the one who sees something that isn’t there or the one who doesn’t see what someone else claims is there?

Those who say these things in this way are "thinking past the sale"; making assumptions that they hope you won't notice. 

It's a trick, regardless of whether AGCC is real or imaginary-- I'm agnostic about that-- a dishonest tactic. Just keep in mind what they are doing every time you hear them use one of those phrases. It's not because they are trying to give you correct information. It's because they are trying to manipulate you. 

They want you to give up liberty, or they mean to take it from you by force.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

The antidote

I intend everything I write to be a therapeutic against the infection of statism. 

Or an antidote for all the shady political poison that has sickened the people tricked into drinking it and damaged the society made up by those poisoned individuals.

If I can rescue just one person, it's all worth it. I'm going to try to help more than that.

I'm obviously not the only one doing what I can to counteract the poisons and fight the infections. There's not just one entity causing the harm; it is going to take more than one person to fight it. It's probably best if people double up. Or take a full complement of treatments, formulated by a wide variety of antipolitical alchemists. There's no such thing as an overdose of liberty.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

Invasion of the Howlers

If, every time I walked out my door, I encountered werewolves, I would probably think about them a lot. 

If werewolves put up signs all around my neighborhood and constantly insisted that I structure my life to accommodate them and their wishes, I would grow to hate them. 

I would tell anyone who'd listen that they aren't obligated to let the werewolves control them or eat them.

I would advocate silver bullets for everyone. I would remind people they have a right to use silver bullets against any werewolf that stands in their way, threatening them.

Anyone who complained and told me to stop talking about werewolves would be exposing themselves as on the side of the werewolves.

Now, replace fictional werewolves with government and you'll see the reality of the situation.

*Just a note-- this is my first time to use an AI. This one: pixlr. I used it to generate the picture above. I used the prompt "Werewolf in a ragged business suit, standing on a suburban street at night under a full moon." I probably should have said "aggressively crouching" instead of "standing", but I don't want to use up my entire free trial on one post.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

Live free to spite the Rulers

In the course of writing my newspaper column for Sunday, I realized this is a planet of political prisoners.

All of us, everywhere on the planet, are being held as political prisoners.

We are held captive by those who mean to rule us with politics. No escape is allowed; they'll kill anyone who tries and looks like they might succeed.

If you don't believe me, just build your own interplanetary spaceship and launch without getting government permission.

This realization is not nearly as negative or defeatist as it might seem at first glance. It depends on how you respond.

That this is how they see you doesn't mean you have to accept your imprisonment or behave like a prisoner. That's up to you. By living free (embracing your outlawry) in spite of the schemes of the political criminals, you spit in their eyes.

We are better than them. We are more ethical than they are. Show them, if they dare to look.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

Dig out the diseased root

When I dig into any social or societal problem, I find government underlying it. Am I hallucinating?

Even if it's true that government is beneath every social or societal problem, this doesn't mean there's not something even more fundamental than government below that. There could be a root cause that expresses itself as government, which then causes the higher-level trouble.

If that's the case, address the disease that causes government.

But government is still a common factor in all the social problems I've looked at. No matter what else people may try to blame. 

It's just not a good strategy to try to govern anyone but yourself. It's going to cause more problems than it solves, every time. You can deny it, you can dispute it, but you can't refute it.

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

Conditioned to accept ridiculous evil

If humanity were free and someone thought up the idea of government today, would anyone fall for it?

I doubt it. It takes a population slowly and relentlessly conditioned over generations to certain absurd beliefs to fall for such an obvious scam. 

Humans have been undergoing this conditioning for thousands of years. Maybe longer. Most members of our species are well conditioned to accept the unacceptable-- to allow someone else to govern them instead of governing themselves like healthy individuals do. Don't judge what healthy humans would accept based on what you see around you. It's not even comparable.

It's interesting to me that the roots of political government reach back to the prehistoric era when people were probably the most superstitious and fearful they have ever been. (Although today's humans seem to be trying to compete for that dubious distinction.)

Unscrupulous characters used this superstition and fear as a way to get their gullible fellow humans to submit to something that wasn't actually good for them, but that they were told was good for them. And necessary.

It must be true because the holy men told them this is what the spirits required. Funny how well this worked out for those holy men.

Just like it works out for the filthy holy men of modern politics. 

This is why I say political government is The Ancestral Enemy. This isn't something new. It has been around as long as there have been crooked people who'd rather govern everyone else than mind their own business-- there's more profit in it. It's ancient. But it has grown and mutated into something with a dishonest veneer of civilization as it becomes more evil in its reach and abilities.

I trust that you see through it; you see it for what it is. If you didn't, you probably wouldn't be reading these words now. Right?

-

Here are some of the 

best ways to help me feel useful

Helping others way to help self

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for January 14, 2024)

Respecting other people's liberty will go a long way toward freeing you.

If you truly understand liberty you'll know why.

There's no reason to enslave yourself with the desire to control the rightful behavior of others.

By encouraging you to respect other people's liberty, I offer you the chance to increase your own, which eventually increases my liberty. It's like a snowball rolling downhill. So is the opposite effect of looking to restrict-- to violate-- the liberty of others.

Whenever I see someone who wants the liberty of others to be violated in some way I think they must not value their own liberty much. Maybe they don't understand what they are doing, or think it's OK since "everybody else does it". Because political government is accepted as a given at this point in human history, it's likely both.

If you don't want people begging politicians for laws to restrict what you do, within your rights, why would you ask politicians to violate the rights of others? This doesn't mean you have to like what others do. Respecting their right to do certain things isn't condoning them. You can even speak out to show your disapproval. You are within your rights as long as you aren't using force to stop them.

Think how much time and energy gets wasted trying to run the lives of others; how much of your life you waste trying to dictate how other people live. Why would you sabotage yourself in this way?

"Does this mean people should be allowed to...?" However you fill in the blank, if it doesn't violate anyone else's liberty, it's none of your business if they do or if they don't. If it's none of your business, by extension, it's none of any government's business. Once you get it, your own liberty will expand beyond your wildest dreams. It only costs you the illusion of control over others. It removes your option to punish people for doing things you'd rather they didn't do.

Considering the state of society, you'll probably have to go first. You'll have to stand aside and respect the liberty of others more than they'll respect yours. Before they'll respect yours, or in spite of the fact they never will. You can be a good neighbor even to those who aren't. Respect their liberty to show respect for yourself. Helping others is a way to help yourself.

-

Consider subscribing or donating.

I couldn't do this without your support.

Also this

Is "useful" elusive?

What is something I could do that would be useful? 

Not just useful for myself, but for liberty. For you.

I’d like to be more useful— as I’ve always wanted to be. I’m not sure that the ways I’ve tried to be useful have been as useful as I’d hoped.

Is my blogging still useful (assuming it ever was)? Does it seem like I have said everything I have to say (after nearly 17 ½ years) and I'm just repeating myself now? What do you think?

What could I do that would be useful?

I’m not going to promote any politician.
I’m not going to align with any political party.
I’m not going to express support for any government institution.
I’ll never support the police or the military in any way.
I’ll never pretend government is legitimate or good. Or necessary. Or that it protects us, or our liberty. That it is anything other than a criminal organization.

Like so many others do with such enthusiasm.

I don't see those things as useful but as actively harmful. It makes me cringe when I see many prominent social media libertarians (Libertarians) doing those things. 

Sure, you do you, but I see so much pro-government extremism from some of them-- many of whom have "libertarian" in their profile name-- that it makes me wonder how they can reconcile it. To me it looks like wanting a seat at the Big Table, some crumbs to snack on, and a pat on the head from people in positions of political power-- who they frequently pose with, smiling from ear to ear. Unironically!

I want to be more useful than that, but at least useful and not harmful.

Any suggestions?

-

Liberty is the greatest good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this

Government = crime

Government is crime. 

If you v*te for more government, you’re v*ting for more crime. 

If you side with government, you're siding with criminals. 

If you want more taxes, you're wanting to force people to fund crime and support the criminals.

If you beg for more "laws", you're asking for criminals to have more power over regular people.

If you want more "gun control" [sic] you're saying you prefer the criminals to have all the guns.

If you demand people "respect the office", you're demanding respect for the criminals in those offices.

If you "back the blue" and "support the troops", you are worshiping the hitmen of the criminal gang.

If you support govschool teachers, you're supporting the criminal gang's recruiters and propagandists.

When is any of this ever the right thing to do?

If you love the Constitution, you love the document that criminals wrote to give the crime gang permission to organize. Yes, it supposedly put limits on what the criminals of the future were allowed to do, but as is so often pointed out, when do criminals obey the rules? It's a straw to grasp at, but it's not going to solve the underlying problem. 

To allow government-- run by anyone-- to exist and function is to embrace crime.

-

Liberty is the greater good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this

Truth can hurt but lies don't help... unless...

Free speech is non-negotiable. But it can and will hurt.

This is not a good reason to censor yourself or others. 

Free true speech is even more valuable.

If you say things just to be polite or to not hurt someone's feelings, you're lying. You should at least say nothing at all if you don't think you should say truthful things in the moment.

But this is when you're dealing with regular people.

The exception is if you're lying to an archator to save his/her victims. In that case, you've done exactly the right thing. Archators aren't ever owed the truth, but since any lie takes something out of you, feel free to lay it on them anyway-- if you're up to it, and if the truth doesn't put innocent people in extra danger. 

Speech, true or lies, has a cost. Free speech isn't free, but it's never as expensive as censorship.

-

Liberty  is the greater good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this

Love and hate

I love this glorious, beautiful planet. All of it. 

I hate the governments which infest and despoil this planet. Every single one of them without exception. The governments which pretend to own all the living things and all the natural wonders, and every square inch of the planet. And beyond.

-

Liberty is the greater good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this

You know it

People seem to instinctively know that authoritarianism— government— is evil. It’s a recurring theme in the most inspiring fiction. 

We know it. We feel it. 

Yet too many people join forces with it because it pays them.

-

Liberty is the greater good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this

Do you believe in fairy tales?

No election that seeks to impose a ruler (to "fill a political office") or enact any type of liberty-rationing legislation.policy is legitimate. Never.

It doesn't matter who v*tes, who counts the v*tes, or how lopsided the results appear to be. It doesn't matter what the results are. 

No one has any right to gang up and decide to violate someone else's rights. Not even if they know that by doing so they are allowing government to violate their own rights that they don't value.

I'm not going to act as though I believe this fairy tale. Because I don't. It's ridiculous.

-

Liberty is the greater good!

If you want to support what I do, you will. If not, you won't.

PayPal -- Venmo -- GiveSendGo

Thank you.

Also this or this