On a recent episode of the Tom Woods podcast, musician and libertarian Eric July lamented the attacks he’s received for being an outspoken libertarian. He’s often told that he’s no longer an authentic black man because he is not a leftist Democrat type.
Tag: responsibility
Proglodytes and Conservatrolls
That’s what I see all around me when I look at how people interact with each other. Of course, the simpler name for proglodytes and conservatrolls would be “statists”, but that just leaves them staring at you with no comprehension in their dull eyes. Most don’t understand that word any better than they’d understand the more fun descriptive terms.
Don’t Hide Behind Good Advice
Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty and wisdom will come to you that way.” – Christopher Hitchens People get confused by conflicting prescriptions for success because they go about the process of analyzing advice all wrong. Advice is an invitation to explore. Nothing more. When you uncritically act on…
Crossroads
We are at the crossroads. We are at a critical station. Will we decide to continue on down, down to the kleptocracy? For awhile, being a robust fledgling nation, we were happy with the richness of freedom without responsibility.
It’s Time to Free All Speech Again
No matter how you feel about Alex Jones and his Infowars media brand, this wasn’t good for free speech. It was the escalation of a war that has been building for some time, where voices running counter to the political biases of the dominant social media empires are being silenced.
Your Right To Yell ‘FIRE!’ in a Theater
It is your absolute human right to say (or write) whatever you want to say. It may not be wise, and in a free society you will be held accountable for any harm you cause by doing so. You have the responsibility to NOT say something untrue which can cause trouble, but no one has the right to silence you.
Radicalism Without Revolution
“Radical” is a scary word, but radicals are (fundamentally) just very consistent people. If they believe in a principle, they believe that it applies to the very root (“radix” – a Latin term) of things. If they believe in non-aggression as a social norm, for instance, they think the value of non-aggression holds true for everyone – including the police officers and bureaucrats and military members whom we normally excuse from this rule.
No One Is Coming to Forgive You
People like us don’t have a hard time with self-responsibility. But we do have a hard time with self-forgiveness. How can “forgiving yourself” count? Isn’t that just cheating?
Life’s Conflicts Are the Plot Points of Your Life’s Story
For some time now I’ve been fascinated by the idea of the monomyth popularized by thinkers like Joseph Campbell, C.S. Lewis, and (more recently) Jordan Peterson. One way of understanding a piece of what they have said is that all humans indeed occupy a story framework. We’re all taking Campbell’s “hero’s journey” and passing through its phases, which may look different for each of us.
A Founding Father’s Fight Against the Constitution
Patrick Henry’s courageous and ceaseless arguments against tyranny have all but been forgotten. School children are taught in American History classes that he once boldly proclaimed “give me liberty or give me death!” But his fearless, bold and unremitting arguments against the Constitution, something he saw as truly tyrannical, are seldom mentioned, much less discussed.