Abel, Charlie: Politics is Rotten
For me, it started in 2006 when I learned about the income tax scam. Then, in 2008, I helped with the Ron Paul
presidential campaign and saw first hand all the backstabbing and what a rotten system politics really is. Then,
I continued to learn by reading the voluntaryist website and listening to Marc Steven's radio show, The No State
Project. After a while, it was a natural progression to realize that a voluntary based society is the only system
that is compatible with human nature, because it's obvious that you can persuade, motivate, and give incentives to
people, but you just can't force them to do anything. The old adage, "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't
make him drink," pretty much sums it up.
A Grateful Subscriber: My Evolution as a Voluntaryist
Dear Carl,
I really appreciate this opportunity to correspond
with you! Of course you know that people with beliefs
like ours are considered the Ultimate Radicals
and I often experience a sense of isolation, even
among friends, because the gulf between my beliefs
and theirs simply cannot be bridged. Even when we
discuss issues [which is often], our conversations
become a game of Devil's Advocate; no matter how
sound my logic, how morally true my arguments,
there seems to be a wall up in their minds that prevents
them from giving any serious thought to the
notion that Government by its very nature is destructive
and immoral.
I found your web page; really enjoyed your article
about the mails. I've also found segments of Lysander
Spooner's NO TREASON on the web, which are incredibly
persuasive, moral and practical (The Constitution
of No Authority, especially, is incredible) .
Since my last letter to you I've read FOR A NEW
LIBERTY and also DISCOVERY OF FREEDOM, by
Rose Wilder Lane . I had been teetering on the edge
of "anarcho-capitalism" when I wrote to you last, and
Rothbard's book, coupled with the issues of THE
VOLUNTARYIST you sent, kicked me right over. The
transformation has given me a surprising sense of peace, as it seems to be my natural inclination, which
I'd never been able to articulate before.
A little about myself: I was raised to be a good
liberal, and chanted the mantra "Regulate, Redistribute"
until I was pregnant and planning a home birth.
I was shocked to discover that midwives had been
"taken in" at gun point, had their records seized, and
been incinerated for "practicing medicine without a
license." From there I discovered vaccination legislation,
homeschooling regulation, and other controls
which I knew instinctively were not in the sphere of
"legitimate" State interference. From there I became
your standard American constitutionalist, Restore
the Constitution, Restore Liberty, etc. I read voraciously,
both extremist patriot literature and more
scholarly studies of American History, and while I
knew that a return to Constitutional principles would
certainly be infinitely preferable to what we have
today, to me it seemed that Constitutional limits on
government were not enough. I was especially annoyed
each time I heard the rallying cry "State's
Rights!", for to my mind, the state had no more right
to control an individual than the feds. But nothing I
read seemed to hit the proverbial nail on the head,
including mainstream Libertarian Party type literature.
When I read the John Singer article in JOURNAL
OF ALTERNATIVE EDUCATION, the name
"Voluntaryist" struck me as something important,
and the rest is history.
I still subscribe to several patriot publications,
with THE NEW AMERICAN being my favorite, but
I have released my fantasy of America Restored as
"the answer," which has not been very difficult. I'd
always had nagging doubts about the reality of
American Liberty (apart from slavery) at any point
in history, as I'd read court cases and quotes from
very early on which struck me as "not quite right". I
just didn't know there was, or could be, anything
MORE right. But an "anarcho-capitalist" friend put
it to me quite well one night. He said something like,
"If we want to avoid the Ultimate Totalitarian State,
a world State, we cannot merely rethink government,
we must exist without it!" And that made perfect
sense to me. It seemed that just as a baby MUST
grow into an adult (unless it dies), the nature of the
State is always to increase its own power, until it
becomes the Ultimate Authority, replacing not only
all national governments, but also the Creator, the
ONLY real nonpolitical authority which exists.
First published in Issue 89 of The Voluntaryist
Buhl, Andrew: How I Became a Voluntaryist
Many years ago I worked with a fellow who said he was a 'libertarian'.
He never explained what it was, other than the fact that libertarians were
ok with him smoking marijuana. I wrote it off as something akin to the
marijuana party. But a seed of a different kind had been planted. Fast
forward to the last year or so when I started to realize that my
involvement in the structured system that most people accept as normal wasn't
working for me, but actually against me and almost every one else, the seed
started to germinate.
I had been talking to a friend in NYC about libertarianism and liked
what I was hearing. I was struggling with some of the social network issues (I
am Canadian) such as socialized medicine and social assistance for the
disabled and unemployed. He agreed that the Canadian model worked better than the
big medicine/ big pharma model from the USA. Then I started to think. I
don't use a regular doctor, I go to a doctor of Traditional Chinese Medicine,
that isn't covered under our provincial health plan. I came to realize i was
paying through the provincial health plan for EVERYONE ELSE'S health
care and then paying cash for my families on top of it. The snowball was
rolling down hill and picking up mass and speed.
Then another friend from Manitoba posted something about voluntaryism on
Facebook. Wow. It blew my mind. It was every thing I knew in my heart to
be right. Living you life the way you want and allowing others to be free.
Such a simple concept but it was like the red pill in the matrix. It
radically changed my life outlook. I read more and realized that government is
self perpetuating, that there is no such thing as just a little government,
that it will always regrow. It made voluntaryism the only conceivable
alternative.
I had been politically active in the past and now realize that none
participation is the only reasoned response in light of the facts I had
been presented with. I realized that heath care, unemployment insurance,
welfare were all more expensive though the system as there are always attendant
administrative cost that are part of normal operations.
Now I am a outspoken and unapologetic voluntaryist. Something I don't
see changing anytime soon.
Duncan, Don: My Political and Economic Re-Education
This is a subject I have thought about since 12 and studied online at mises.org. among other sites. I went to the library at 13 and checked out "The Communist Manifesto" because my father and grandfather were communists. I was given books by Marx and Engles my father had hidden. He was afraid to admit his political beliefs for a long time. We met a 74 year old socialist economist who ran his garden supply & nursery when I was 16. Every Sunday, if it was raining, we would discuss politics and economics for hours instead of working in the garden or yard. Harvey (the socialist) told me to investigate the Federal Reserve Act. He claimed it was the worst piece of legislation ever passed. I have read many books on it. He was correct. My political and economic re-education was by independent reading, not in the public system. I remember being sent to the principle's office at Whitney Ave. School for asking questions of my teacher, Jack Smith, could not answer. Why? Because my questions pointed out his contradictions. (He claimed the U.S. was Capitalist but could not explain import taxes to protect American businesses at the expense of American consumers.) At La Sierra I constantly argued with Mr. Frizzi when he criticized Capitalism. His slanders were unsubstantiated and I kept pointing that out. At 16 I had become a Capitalist despite my upbringing. I do not believe this country has been Capitalist for 100 years. It was never completely Capitalist. It has always had a mixed economy, part Capitalist and part Socialist. There is no third system and the mixture is unstable and becomes Socialist because Capitalism has not been understood, even by Capitalist businessmen. Ayn Rand wrote a book to explain why Capitalism is the only system that works: "Capitalism, the Unknown Ideal". If this were taught in school we would not have the current mess, here and worldwide. But a public school would not allow such a book. Government and Socialism support each other. They are both founded on the idea that the individual must be sacrificed to the "general welfare". In this system we are asked to accept injustice on a personal scale for a "greater good". No property rights can exist under this system even though the proponents claim the reverse. No right to life exists also. This system had been tried for thousands of years in hundreds of cultures. The most remarkable resent example is the USSR. After 74 years of untold suffering and denial of reality, they finally admitted it was not working. Socialists here are NOT deterred. The same can be said around the world. The problem is they have no idea how freedom works, even though they use the word. Why should they? Schooling is by government which always indoctrinates in one way: authoritarianism. Public schools teach us to be a good citizen, i.e., follow the law, i.e., do what we are told, even if it makes no sense or if it seems irrational or self destructive. This is pure superstition. It is the most dangerous, anti-life superstition ever proposed. It must be questioned. It must be exposed and rejected.
We see this superstition go unquestioned in the article about Wal-Mart you sent. It proposed we let Wal-Mart run the country. What does it mean to "run the country"? It means to rule. I don't want to be ruled or be ruler. I want to self govern. I want to protect myself because no one has ever come up a system that will protect me from a group of monopoly protectors. Private protection agencies may be flawed but they can be fired and must guard their reputation. Government has no such restraint. As all the world's experiments with government have shown; all governments grow into monsters.
We don't need a violent revolution. All we need to do is: stop supporting our destroyers.
I shop at Wal-Mart a lot. They are a good example of a more or less free market. I really love Trader Joe's and Whole Foods Market. These 3 get 95% of my business. I would use the farmer's market if it was closer.
Fox, Garrett:Voluntarily Coming From Truth and Change
About 10 years ago I was told that it'd be in my best interest to open a bank account to have somewhere to store the money that I was earning. Seemed reasonably at the time. That's what you're supposed to do right?
So I open the account and was told I could open a checking/debit account for easier transactions. I said "Ok cool, sign me up". I even got a card with my picture on it. This was really exciting for me at the time. I was growing up and taking control of my life.
Little did I know that a year later I was going to get the first in my face dose of "things are not what they seem". I was tight on cash but was confident that I had enough money [in my year old account] to put some gas in my car. Paid at the pump, gassed up and headed home. The next day I get an email that my account had been over drafted. They had charged me $5 for dropping below the $25 minimum balance requirement.
So I'm getting charged for not have enough funds? How is that right? Then, because of that initial $5 fee my account over drafted from the gas I purchased and I was charged another fee. This one was $30! Now my account balance was actually a negative number. I owed my bank money because I wasn't thinking about all the fine print from a year ago.
This all started a chain reaction of money issues for me which I was eventually able to work out. But, I've never trusted a bank since.
Not too much longer after getting my first taste of being legally robbed, a major national incident happened. I was sitting in my 11th grade US History class [of all the classes i could have been in] when one of the other teachers came frantically into our class with a TV. A couple of planes had just plowed into the twin towers. Just watching the videos of the towers falling, I could tell something wasn't right. It just felt like I was being lied to. Why would these buildings just fall straight down like that? I kept asking myself. Not to mention my school mates where running around excited about how we where getting out early that day. The whole world had changed, almost like a movie.
For the next 7 years I just floated through life. Knowing that things weren't alright. We're in all of these wars, gas prices are exploding and we're in this "Greatest Depression". I felt trapped. Well then I'm just going to party and work on my career, I decided. So somehow (it's a long story) I ended up in Las Vegas. Living with a couple gnarly roommates, this is where I really started pulling my head out of the sand.
My roommate walks up to me and starts saying something about this new agenda to combine Canada, the US and Mexico. There was even this supposed new currency called the Amero. How the hell is this possible and I've never heard a thing about it? So my rommate shows me this crazy movie [you might have heard of it] called Zeitgeist. "Ladies and gentlemen, please fasten your seatbelts it's going to be a crazy ride". This opened the floodgates. I wanted to know MORE.
I had all of these questions now. From "how does nobody know this" to "You mean I don't have to pay taxes"? Every question I had that got answered, just led me to more questions. Now I had a mission, a goal, something to live for. Expose the truth. Through further research I stumbled upon a little group by the name of We Are Change based out of New York City. Then I started a Meetup for our chapter in Maryland. It's an awesome thing when you're searching the internet about a particular topic and you come across a website that you can join and share ideas with other like-minded individuals. It all has to start somewhere.
After a couple years of street actions, protests and hours of conversation with people who just didn't want to hear any of it, I got frustrated. I get it, so how come my friends and family are so content with ignoring the things I'm trying to show them. All of this anger and frustration led up to one question in my mind, "How can I live free, right now"? It was this question that led me to New Hampshire's Free State Project.
There are people already joining together to live in liberty oriented communities up in New Hampshire? They're living there lives to the fullest and not asking for permission?! This is where I stumbled upon the website for the 2010 Porcupine Freedom Festival. Before I could even finish the event description, I was forwarding the link to all of my friends and making preparations to take off of work so I could go see what this festival was all about. This was, by far, the best thing I have ever done for myself.
I came in there as a constitutionalist who was getting ready to run for my district's Republican Central committee. I didn't want to be a registered republican but I needed to do something more constructive than just my local activism. And boy did PorcFest change that! Who knew a bunch of Anarchists with guns could be so intelligent?
Through many conversations and after watching a ton of great speakers and debates, I was starting to realize something. Freedom doesn't come from the top down. It comes from within. I realized that I didn't have to wait for the system to collapse, or for everybody to wake up. I could start living more free everyday.
Leave it to an event like PorcFest to turn a "Truther" into an individualist-anarchist-voluntaryistor whatever you want to label it today. I have had a blast so far, learning ways to avoid all these governmental constraints. And just doing things everyday without anyones permission, as long as it doesn't conflict with the Non-Agression Principle. I've never had such good relationships with friends and such a joy for life since I became a Voluntaryist
Geddes, Raymond:My Story
What follows is a brief history of a conversion to libertarianism.
I was born in 1924-6years after the mess that was WW1 and started in the 1st grade in 1930. My family
REALLY knew what the depression was. There was very little money. My father was a Roosevelt supporter Democrat.
I remember him [a one-horse businessman] arguing with his boyhood friend who was a bureaucrat and was anti-Roosevelt and
on the other side.
As the war clouds gathered, we were very patriotic and I joined the Army in 1942. My first claim to fame is that at 0125 on D-Day I jumped into Normandy with the 501st Parachute infantry ,101st A/B Division and of course like many others was wounded later on in that operation. I was not yet 20 at the time but I will say that I grew up in the Army. My second claim to fame is that when I became 21 I cast my first vote-- For Roosevelt...
As an aside, those of us who were in the service got rid of Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo-- the external threats to the USA and freedom. You today have a far more difficult job getting rid of the internal threat-- the rot that exists in Washington D.C. I fear for the future of freedom.
Anyway, I was discharged in 1946 and went through the University of Maryland graduating in 1951-10 years after high school. I had long realized something was wrong but did not know what. Then, in 1979 my son gave me Robert Ringer's "Restoring the American Dream". If ever a book changed my thinking it was that book. It really opened my eyes. Later on, attending the Free University courses at Johns Hopkins given by Carl completed my conversion to libertarianism and I have been one ever since.
As Carl once said, "libertarianism or voluntaryism does not have all of the answers but it is sure better than what we have now".
McIntyre, Terry: How I Became a Voluntaryist
In my teens, when I came across the Henry Thoreau quote about "that
government is best which governs not at all", it made perfect sense to
me. When I later fathered two children, the most natural thing in the world
was to teach them myself - not that I know everything, but it was obvious to
me that many teachers at government-regulated schools knew far less.
Today, my daughter teaches her five children. The eldest just completed
"third grade" (he is nine years old) , took a standardized Woodcock
Johnson test, and achieved "18th grade equivalent" on all math sections; the
rest of his skills aren't too shabby, either. His siblings are far ahead of
the norms in many categories. The same is widely true of home-schooled
children; they average about 35 percentile points higher than their peers.
I spent years trying to work with minarchists, viewing them as sort of
"fellow travelers" - we were going in the same direction, and would
discuss the final destination when we got closer, in theory. However, over the
years, I've seen many minarchists become warhawks; they view "defense"
as one of the "proper" roles of government, and forget that all the
libertarian criticisms of socialism - the public choice argument that special
interests will capture the bulk of benefits, and the inability of socialist
"markets" to calculate what is worth doing, or how to do it efficiently - apply
just as much to the military as to any other socialist institution.
Nowadays, I avoid politics and stick to the basics: helping and
encouraging people to teach their own, to defend their own, and to provide for the
well-being of their own, through voluntary cooperation. When enough of
us get used to doing these things for ourselves, the State will be seen as
obviously superfluous and counterproductive.
Mower, Brodie: My Voluntaryist Story
About eight years ago, I purchased a Nissan 350z. I then joined my350z.com. They had a politics section. I decided
to go there. I posted a thread stating I thought that there needed to be more regulations to keep businesses in check.
At the time I would probably have considered myself a conservative Democrat. To my surprise, the posters on the forum
posted a resounding no to my question. I then had a long conversation with them (I later found out they were
libertarians) after which I had to conclude that they were right and that regulations were bad for businesses to thrive
and unnecessary as well for product safety. Over the next couple of years I had more conversations with them. I then
started looking for more content and ran across cato.com and fee.org. I read them for a while and then came across
mises.org and freetalklive.com. By this time I had become a minarchist. After having quite a bit of discussion on
mises.org and listening to freetalklive, I finally gave up the whole idea of needing government. The whole process took
about six years. Later I discovered Marc Stevens website and bought his book Adventures in Legal Land. This solidified
my understanding of justice and how exactly government courts are not just.
