When I put principle first, I’m better able to judge the compatibility of parties, people, and the past with what I believe in. And when my understanding of those things change, it’s easier to move on. I’m also less likely to be fooled and subsequently betrayed.
Tag: obedience
My Ongoing Battle with Leviathan
In January of this year (2017) I was notified that my 2015 tax return was going to be audited. 2015 was the first tax year that I wasn’t completely a W2 employee. Half the year was W2, the other 1099. Surprise, surprise, I was one of the lucky ones chosen to be told I owe more money. I responded to the audit request with a request of my own: give me the information you used to determine your code and constitution apply to me, and I’m happy to cooperate.
The Problem With Obedience: Why You Really Don’t Want An Obedient Child
Wouldn’t it be nice if your children just did what you asked all the time? Do you ever have this thought? Of course you do! You have children. I have had the same thoughts (trust me), but when you really think about the long term consequences of obedience and how that looks in a relationship, you start to really question our culture’s parenting methods.
Spanking Kids is a Result of Your Pain, Not Their Behavior.
For an adult who wasn’t taught to identify their emotions and own them as their own, spanking or swatting is, unfortunately, the easiest way to respond to a child who has triggered us. We are literally being exactly like a child when we hit. We are in our child minds because we were not taught a better way.
Teachers Are Like Cops
If you do exactly what they say and convince yourself that they know better than you … you might think they are good people doing a good thing. Once you choose not to live under the thumb of other people, the people who wish to bully you will show themselves to be bullies.
Such a Sad Life
Is it really a sad thing to accept the nature of reality and ethical behavior? To understand that theft and aggression are wrong, even if you don’t feel they actually harm you? Even if you deny the acts in question are theft and aggression? I certainly don’t think so.
Valid Laws Are Universalizable And Immutable
The laws of morality have been described as Common Law, Natural Law, or the Golden Rule. They are something most parents endeavor to teach their children. Don’t hit and don’t take other people’s stuff. This is a very concise summary of recognition of self-ownership, property rights, and non-aggression. A law degree is not needed to understand basic rules of morality.
Question Authority
Ultimately, the questioning of authority is not only a good thing. It is a necessary thing. It is the backbone of freedom. Cherish the right to protest. Cherish the right to be different. Cherish the right to question authority.
Authority and Morality
The decisions people make and the directions that people go in may in the end not serve them or lead to the kind of results that they want, but that is for each person to discover on their own. Advice can be given, suggestions can be made, but ultimately each person must walk their own path themselves. To try to play games of authority is to attempt to ignore all of this.
A Common Sense Foundation for Liberty
“The foundation of my libertarianism is much more modest: common sense morality. At first glance, it may seem paradoxical that such radical political conclusions could stem from anything designated as “common sense.” I do not, of course, lay claim to common sense political views. I claim that revisionary political views emerge out of common sense moral views. As I see it, libertarian political philosophy rests on three broad ideas.”