People are not all the same, and they make different choices because they have different values, circumstances, and levels of understanding. Sometimes those choices are peaceful and wise; sometimes they are not. So what are the best ways to promote good choices and cooperation while preventing and providing resolution for conflict?
Tag: privacy
A Voluntaryist 7-Point Plan
As advocates of a truly free society, we voluntaryists, unlike the statists who outnumber us, do not engage in traditional political activism. This simple fact got me thinking about a habitual plan or checklist each of us might form or follow quite naturally, in the course of our daily lives in order to promote the kind of stateless socioeconomic order we envision.
Cash in Ancapistan
Money provides such an advantage over barter, that it is indispensable for a functioning economy today. Modern civilization has been accustomed to a government or pseudo-government entity creating and maintaining a money supply. Indeed, these currencies have dominated the economy across the globe throughout living memory. Recently, cryptocurrencies have been on the rise, but they are far from replacing dollars, pounds, and yuan. In a truly free society, how would money be provided for the economy?
Privacy and Politics: The Hypocrisy of the Surveillance Statists
So long as American politicians and bureaucrats continue to put the rest of us under a magnifying glass, they deserve no sympathy when they get caught trying to hide their own actions from public view.
@YesYoureRacist Crowdsources Social Preferencing
The main objection to @YesYoureRacist doesn’t cut much ice with me. The project is not an “invasion of privacy” or a “violation of rights.” The Charlottesville marchers engaged in public action with the explicit purpose of attracting attention. Mission accomplished. They got noticed.
Law as a Tool to Get What We Want
Imports threatening domestic production? Raise tariffs! Cheap labor threatening labor unions? Enact a minimum wage! Businessmen without scruples ripping off easy prey? Occupational licensure! Boogeyman at the front door? Increase the “defense” budget! Your neighbor is sodomizing his friend in the privacy of his home? Ban all the gays!
Privacy: J. Edgar’s Not The Hoover You Need to Worry About Anymore
In the latest phase of our frenzied technological advancement, it’s clear that yes, our gadgets do collect and use more and more information about us, and that that information progressively ramifies across more, bigger, and more integrated networks. The bigger question: Is it worth it? The answer: It depends.
Snooping Archators
Privacy-invading technology has the potential to be annoying but is only dangerous because you– or someone– allows aggressive, thieving gangs to use the collected data to molest and control you.
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.
Someone, not Santa, is Always Watching
A paper recently published by a professor in Canada suggests that the popular “Elf on the Shelf” game is conditioning children to accept the surveillance state. The notion of the Elf on the Shelf is that a small elf doll is actually a scout elf who reports nightly to Santa Claus on the activities that occur in his house. Parents are supposed to reinforce this story by relocating the elf each night so that his journey and return seem more plausible.