No Place to Hide—So We Don't Hide at All.
Where we are and where we’ll be (DN 3.13)
Cover page | Preface | Introduction 1 | Introduction 2 | Introduction 3 |
(Part I) Why: 1.0 | 1.1 | 1.2 | 1.3 | 1.4 | 1.5 | 1.6 | 1.7 | 1.8 | 1.9 | 1.10 | 1.11 | 1.12 | 1.13 | 1.14 | 1.15 | 1.16 | 1.17 | 1.18 | 1.19 | 1.20 | 1.21 |1.22
(Part II) What: 2.0 | 2.1 | 2.2 | 2.3 | 2.4 | 2.5 | 2.6 | 2.7 | 2.8 | 2.9 | 2.10 I 2.11 | 2.12 | 2.13 | 2.14 | 2.15 | 2.16 | 2.17 | 2.XX | 2.18 | 2.19 | 2.20 | 2.21 | | Where: 3.0 | 3.1 | 3.2 | 3.3 | 3.4 | 3.5 | 3.6 | 3.7 | 3.8 | 3.9 | 3.10 | 3.11 | 3.12 | 3.13
(Note: This is an installment of The Distributed Nation. For installments of The Freedom Scale (book), see here.
Chapter 3.13
Where we are and where we’ll be
We’ve reached the end of Chapter 3: Where. It’s time to sum it up and move on.
Review
Our distributed nation will not occupy a single territory with fixed borders, but that does not mean that it doesn’t have a locative component. The where of the distributed nation is wherever you are. Your location. Your property. Your sovereign space.
We have discussed how important that is. How important your property is.
More generally, we have examined how important property is to human survival.
The concept of THIS IS MINE isn’t “selfish.” The concept of THIS IS MINE is essential to all living things. Toddlers understand this. Animals understand this. Socialists and well-meaning people sometimes struggle with it, but when push comes to shove, even they will assert their property rights. Because property is sine qua non for life itself.
We have explored the fact that freedom is your natural state of being. The state of nature isn’t something you “escape.” We owe a debt to Locke and the natural lawyers of the Enlightenment, but they were wrong about this! The state of nature is reality. It is government that is the artificial construct.
We established that the distributed nation is, and will be, a worldwide phenomenon. As such, its where is where you are…anywhere in the world.
We reinforced that the fundamental unit of the distributed nation is, and always will be, the individual human person. But we then acknowledged the reality of the ultra-social nature of our species—our need to form groups. Most of us want to be with our fellows, to one extent or another. Groups are good…so long as they are chosen, not imposed.
We explored the concept of time preferences, and established that civilizations are built on low time-preferences—on future orientation. And that that includes the need for people to continue having babies!
We began a discussion of various ways that individual members1 might form larger voluntary associations within our distributed nation. Couples, of course, and families, and houses worthy of the noble principles we hold dear and share.
We talked about the need to watch out for each other, and share fellowship, while also making sure not to poke the dragon in the eye. And we envisioned the larger units we might form beyond the couple, family, and house level: claves, clans, hundreds, and more.
We examined the benefits of ownership, and established that ownership must be total—that no one has a legitimate right to claim overlordship over you or your property.
Finally, we declared that no one has any right to claim superior overlordship to areas beyond this planet, any more than they do on terra firma—and that our vision as a people is every bit as worthy of being applied in space as it is here.
What’s yours is yours.
The clear takeaway: your stuff is yours, and ought to be treated as such by every other human, in or out of government. By right, you should have allodial title to your property.
Some argue that there are legal methods to claim, de jure, allodial title to one’s land and home. We will certainly look into those. But we also know that states are not going to give in easily.
We are going to have to get creative. And we will need to be patient.
In chapter 2, we discussed the different kinds of efforts being formulated and implemented in pursuit of true human independence. Some are territorial in nature. Others are panarchic, or fully online. Ours is a combination.
Our approach has several advantages…
Yes, the philosophy of what’s yours is yours is a message to all governments who claim to be superior landlords over us and our property. But this philosophy also applies within our distributed nation.
In order to understand how and why, we must recognize that a proper framework of human independence includes a set of essential rights:
to ESTABLISH your own polity, association, or nation;
to AFFILIATE with a polity, association, or nation on mutually agreed terms;
to EXIT from any polity, association, or nation;
to SECEDE, unilaterally and without hindrance, from any government or involuntary imposition of authority; and,
to REMAIN on one’s own property and not AFFILIATE any polity, association, or nation.
In our distributed nation concept, there is no central authority to claim overlordship of your property. It’s yours. The distributed nation respects your framework rights.
Having everyone on their own property reduces barriers to entry and exit. Join us. And then later, you can un-join if you want, and do your own thing. No hassles, no confusion.
Making sense of a big world
The world is big. Our plans are big. Like all movements, we will start small, and grow.
One day, while working through all the concepts here, a question popped into my head: can I diagram the bigness of it all?
I first pictured a depiction of the concept of subsidiarity (a.k.a. sphere sovereignty): concentric circles, beginning with the individual in the center and then moving outwards through all the typical spheres. First the family, then the community and wider economic market, and then all the typical divisions of government: local, country, state, federal (or however it shakes out wherever you are). My thought was that we should be able to do something similar for our distributed nation.
Since our nation will not be like any other that has been before, any such depiction will look different. With no central authority, for example, it would have to be less political and more natural—taking shape based on organic human groups and physical, geographical regions.
I was sure that—somehow—there would be a way depict all these categories in one chart and place each one in the appropriate sphere (or overlapping spheres as needed).
So I dug in one day and did it:
It looks confusing at first, but if you spend time with it, it all falls into place. Starting at the top, we depict the physical reality in which we exist…
Physical
There are lots of different methods people have used to categorize and divide up the lands and seas of this planet. I have chosen to combine several into our own system.
Space
We’re not there yet, but we will be one day.
Earth
We live on a planet floating in space. (Is “floating” the right word?)
Meta-region
Our planet has two large, continuous landmasses: The Americas and Afro-Eurasia. (The New World and the Old.) Australia and Antarctica are also considered continents, and there are many other islands scattered through out the world’s oceans.
Because of that proliferation of islands, I have chosen to add two more meta-regions, based on the world’s two main oceans. Everything east of the Cape of Good Hope, west of Cape Horn, and south of the Bering Strait (including the Indian ocean, Australia, and all the other islands in the area is Pacifica, and all the rest (including Antarctica and the Arctic Ocean) is Atlantica.
(Note that the purpose here is not, as it is with governments, to divide up the Earth in order to rule it. Rather, it is simply to understand it, and to know where we are on it. Also, we must take into account the possibility that seasteading will proliferate in future, making the oceans much more significant places of habitation.)
Continent
The landmasses of Earth can be divided up in a number of different ways:
In keeping with our physical approach to understanding the where of planet Earth, I prefer the six geological continents as the best choice: North America, South America, Africa, Eurasia, Australia, Antarctica.
Physiographic regions
(Physiographic regions are a means of defining Earth's landforms into independently distinct, mutually exclusive areas, independent of political boundaries.2)
Once again, in keeping with our physical, non-political approach, the physiographic system is the best choice. There have been different naming conventions for the various levels within the physiographic system (the names used by the system’s creator were a bit confusing). I prefer realm, region, sub-region, and area.
So, for example, I live in Eastern North America, in the Interior Plains, on the Great Lakes Plain, on the Niagara Escarpment, west of the Genesee River, and so on.
Locale
We can drill down further, to fix our physical locations more precisely. On the bank of such-and-such river; on the east slope of such-and-such mountain; in the area between this and that landform (or road); etc.
Again, the idea here is to know where we are in human terms, not political terms.
Dwelling
Finally, we get to the specific place where you live.
Governmental
I then matched these with governmental categories, on the left side of the chart.
In governmental terms, where you live is called your address. Your address is in a town, village, or city (or ‘unincorporated’ rural area), which is part of local and regional governmental subdivisions, which are part of a country. Some countries are small, and some span entire continents. The same is the case with the other units, which is why I show such divisions as overlapping multiple circles.
Of course, we now have governmental and quasi-governmental multinational organizations (The UN, EU, etc.) that also span large areas.
Organic
Moving down, we have the organic units of human organization: couples form families, which develop into extended families and clans, and, over time, into lineages. These are part of populations (ethnic groups and subgroups, etc.), who together form our species.
Here too, I sought to match these with our physical locales. Individuals, couples, and families live in a dwelling; extended families and clans spread out from there; and so on.
Distributed Nation
Finally, we show our distributed nation off to the right, matching the units we envision—house, clave, crew, clan, etc.—with the corresponding physical and organic units.
As discussed, once we have grown in number and proliferation, we may develop even larger units, based on region, decimal divisions, or other criteria. And, though it is getting ahead of ourselves somewhat, we should at least hold an ideal vision in mind: that one day, we will carry our principles into the solar system and beyond.
Finally, as the chart depicts, the Alliance for Human Independence will be there to help at every level, from the individual on up.
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Yes, this is all quite big, and we are quite small. Every movement starts small—meeting by candlelight, or in a coffee shop, or on a hillside. Or here on the internet.
We have a long way to go, of course. But we’ve got to start somewhere.
Hiding in plain sight
As of right now, we all live in nonconsensual systems. If you did not consent to be governed in the first place—explicitly and transparently—then you did not consent.
Did you? Did you sign anything? Voting is not consent. Voting is kabuki.
If you are not allowed to withdraw your consent, then it was never consent to begin with. And you’re clearly not allowed to withdraw your consent.
Ignore the people who say, “Well, if you don’t like it, you can leave.” The point is that you should not have to move to be free. If you are not allowed to be free right where you are, then you are not allowed to be free. Full stop.
You are clearly not allowed to leave this “arrangement.” You will be punished for any escape attempts. You are, in a very real sense, a kind of slave.
This is not going to get fixed overnight. We will have to be patient. For a time, we will have to build within the belly of the beast.
There is currently no place to hide from these beasts, so for now…
We hide in plain sight.
“Members”—is that what we’re calling ourselves? It’s certainly better than “citizens,” with all the baggage that has. Is there a better term?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physiographic_region (Yes, it’s Wikipedia, but in this case, the source works.)
How can we consent to anything? The government is making it all up as we go along. Remember, these people are some of the dumbest on the planet who have no place else to go.
Great graphic with the circles! Helpful to have for those of us who benefit from visualizing information.