Although I admit that the outcome in a stateless society will be bad, because not only are people not angels, but many of them are irredeemably vicious in the extreme, I conjecture that the outcome in a society under a state will be worse, indeed much worse, because, first, the most vicious people in society will tend to gain control of the state and, second, by virtue of this control over the state’s powerful engines of death and destruction, they will wreak vastly more harm than they ever could have caused outside the state.
Tag: lying
Is the Non-Aggression Principle Self-Negating? You Decide!
A person named Jared emailed me out of the blue about a week ago with the following letter. It contains a request for feedback followed by an argument that the Non-Aggression Principle as made popular by Murray Rothbard was self-negating on the grounds that the creation of private property is an act of aggression. What ensued were several letters back and forth in which we both flesh out the other’s argument and offer our critique. In the end we understood each other better, but alas no consensus was reach.
How to Unschool
1. Give your love generously and criticism sparingly. Be your children’s partner. Support them and respect them. Never belittle them or their interests, no matter how superficial, unimportant, or even misguided their interests may seem to you. Be a guide, not a dictator. Shine a light ahead for them, and lend them a hand, but don’t drag or push them. You will sometimes despair when your vision of what your child ought to be bangs up against the reality that they are their own person. But that same reality can also give you great joy if you learn not to cling to your own preconceived notions and expectations.
Advice from Cops: Don’t Talk to Cops
Almost every time I speak at a college or law school campus, there are one or two audience members whose mother or father is a police officer or a prosecutor. I always ask them: What did your parents tell you about dealing with the police? Every one of them, without exception, has told me the same thing: My parents in law enforcement taught me years ago that I should never talk to the police, or agree to let them interview me about anything, or let them search my car or my apartment or my backpack without a warrant. You need to stop for a minute, and let that sink in.
Wanting Someone Else to Fulfill Our Lives
I have a friend who is lonely, who has such a good heart and desperately wants to find a partner who appreciates that goodness, to share a life with. We have all felt this, I’m guessing: this desire for a deep connection, this hope that another person will just get us and want an intimate relationship with us, the idea that if we could just find this person and merge with them, we’d be fulfilled. What if we tossed that idea out on its head? What if everything we need for happiness and fulfillment is within us?
Modern Copyright Built on an Obsolete Assumption
When copyright was reinstated in 1710, the justification was that of publishing being many orders of magnitude more expensive than authoring, and so without it, nothing would get published. But the Internet has reversed this assumption completely: publishing is now many orders of magnitude cheaper than writing the piece you want to publish.
Oppression: Symptoms and Causes
It doesn’t take any great perceptiveness or astute powers of observation to notice that a lot is wrong with the world today. But if those loudly reporting the “wrongness” aren’t also aware of the root causes, and what can be done to actually change things, then mostly the message just becomes frustrating and depressing to listen to. And if people continually express righteous anger and indignation at the injustice they see, only to then propose pointless, worthless solutions—or no solutions at all—that doesn’t really help.
The Relational Anarchist Primer
According to relational anarchists, the better humans connect with each other, the more peace and understanding that will exist between them. The greater the strength of the relationships, the less likely rulers will become necessary or begin to emerge. Anarchism means “without rulers.” And besides being a political assertion, this is a psychological and relational preference. It is apolitical, based on preferred relationship standards. Instead of dispensing violence, these anarchists dispense compassion.
Lethal Threats From Trespassers
If you are flying war planes in a threatening manner around someone’s home territory, you are the bad guy. You deserve to have those planes shot down. The pilots are being bad guys and deserve to die. If you call any objection or resistance to your planes “aggression” you are lying. If you are a military employee breaking stuff and threatening people in someone else’s home territory, and you get shot, you were the bad guy. It’s no different from a homeowner shooting a burglar or rapist he catches in his house.
Discomfort and Agony
Physical discomfort can be a problem. It really can. I have slept lying in cold, standing water. I’ve had a kidney stone so painful I was curled into the fetal position on the floor. And don’t even ask about the bike wreck when I was 12, and its aftermath! Makes me shudder to remember! And there have been various other painful or uncomfortable times besides those. But the psychological pain of being violated on a daily basis by statists and other archators is just as real. But statists can’t see any possible way they are causing pain, and if they do, they don’t care. It’s “worth it” to them.