An Amazing Chapter Christopher: "No one ever asked for our consent. Governments simply lie and say we consented to their rule, when we clearly did not. And then they proceed to violate our rights, each and every day. Our moral premise, our commandment, is that this should never happen to anyone."
And I give you a Special Thanks and much Respect because you gave credit where credit was due, in this case to Neal Stephenson "It was this vision that first set my mind alight . . . ". This tells me you are a True Leader who gives proper credit and does not Usurp others. To me the Usurper (Who Usurped the Divine God) caused all the mess we have had since time began. In my field I see Usurpers all the time.
That is the pure arrogance of government as they treat the citizens like they are the same numbskulls that actually do run the government. We are not as we see the folly in believing any government is good for us.
The reason they never ask for consent is because many would say no and that would undermine their tyranny. The same with mRNA poisons, WHO and the UN. Even if you say no, they ignore you and proceed with more terrorism. We have reached our limits.
Consent? What is this mythical word mean? We are born into the country we belong to. We are given no choice as to how it's run, how it treats people, or how it makes rules.
It reminds me of the lyrics from an old song.
And when the sky darkens and the prospect is war
Who's given a gun and then pushed to the fore?
And expected to die for the land of our birth
Though we've never owned one lousy handful of earth.
I'd rather live where I want, surrounded by like minded people, and be able to contribute to the rules of said place. But we aren't given that choice.
I like your choice of "distributed nation" as a brief designation for our concept of intentional communities based on true consent. Some try to claim the us constitution is a contract. However I know of no genuine contract that you can be threatened with coercive force if you try to exit it, and it is going to cost you plenty. A good contract should plainly state what the penalties are for dissolving it if any before you ever sign on the dotted line. I don't recall doing that.
Jefferson's famous "consent of the governed" is twisted to mean the consent of the majority, this is "the people," yet even that is a lie, since there was never even a choice of whether you wanted to be a party to it, and no winning national vote I ever saw actually was provably the majority of the whole population, nor does the majority actually select these people who supposedly run to represent (the supposed majority of) us.
And even if it did have an actual majority, it is by some slender margin like most of the electoral races this election season. It means almost half the people get forced to accept what the other 51% wanted, if you assume the 51% even really knew any of these people they voted for and knew they would actually do what the 51% want. Once (s)elected they seem to do pretty much what the well paid lobbyists pay (bribe) them to do.
I entirely agree that every moral MUST-NOT transgression can be framed as a theft or a kind of theft. But "thou shalt not steal" in and of itself does not send as complete message as our first protocol, as written. It can easily be misread to exclude some of those transgressions. Whereas the first protocol, as written, is harder to misinterpret. (Although admittedly not as pithy!)
Just as everything can be framed as theft, everything can be framed as a violation of consent. Indeed, if you come over and take my pruning saw from the garage with my permission, then it is not theft. If I ask my wife to lie to me and tell me I am handsome when I clearly am not, then it is lying, but there is no wrong, since I consented. Consent seems to be the top level concern…
I had a thought too along the lines of Governments are the thieves of your consent at birth by issuing a birth certificate whereas your mother signs your straw-man contract for your legal fiction to give them consent over you . Keep toiling you make brilliant arguments:)
Thank you. Others have done great work on the subject of birth certificates, tacit contracts, unrefuted affidavits, jurisdictions, etc. I know next to nothing on the subject. But I do plan to try to explore this area and see if there is anything we can do in that regard.
I considered it. But “nation” just has more juice somehow. I like the word polity, but nation seems to encompass something bigger. Some of this is, of course, just a matter of taste and perception. But “nation” does also have the advantage of being a more familiar word. Thanks for considering the question!
I also perceive, and am grateful for, your classy choice of referring to an earlier piece but not linking to it. I am fine with posting pertinent links to one's own work—it makes sense for all of us to do it once in a while. But some people post links in every single comment. Not doing that seems the classier and more respectful choice.
It can be awkward to know how many links and how often to throw them into comments, whether or not they're links to my work. I sometimes think I link too much, too frequently.
On a related note, are you lining up any podcast appearances as DN progresses? The Bad Roman? Others?
Yes, it is always a question. We all have info to impart, and a certain amount of self-promotion is inevitable and reasonable. I think it is easy enough to tell when it goes overboard, though. And you never do :-)
I am hoping to go back to doing appearances in late winter. Writing this installments is keeping me too busy already—I have little time for anything else. It'll be better to do it once the intense writing is over and I have a completed product to discuss. (I sure hope it can be done by late winter!)
I know you've already chosen the name, but if you ever change your mind wouldn't "charity" work.
Something like "Human Liberation Charity"
Since the goal is to work for the freedom of the human race, a clear social benefit, it could be classified as a charity. And the word has good connotations.
Under this banner you can also fight sexual slavery, human trafficking, and similar. Earning the organisation a positive reputation as saviours, and providing a source of recruits both from the saved victims and from people who want to help save others.
At the same time, this protection from enslavement can be afforded to the members themselves. In the form of, for instance, spreading knowledge of lasting tax efficient structures, networking with similar groups, and credit unions.
One could also build survival bunkers with huge supply stocks and hydroponics justifying it as preparation for climate change.
Whether or not you believe in it doesn't matter.
The availability of a safe haven for members to retreat to during disasters will greatly increase their loyalty to the movement and the difficulty of external entities from applying pressure and physical threats.
When you suggest "survival bunkers," do you mean individuals doing their own, or do you mean somehow making them for lots of members to use?
I love the idea of spreading knowledge internally. That is definitely part of the plan.
I had not given much thought to specific campaigns of external action (fighting sexual trafficking, e.g.). More just to the general notion of being well-behaved and setting a peerless example. I will have to give that more thought.
On the name: I get the idea you are going for, but the noun "charity" isn't strong enough, and denotatively, it diverges and misleads from the actual nature of the the thing. IOW, it makes it sound like a charity rather than a nation. A "charity" might just be an organization, whereas this is actually a new kind of nation. Know what I mean, Jellybean?
I meant the creation of larger survival bunkers, for at least dozens of people.
I'm not against people having their own individual bunkers, far from it, but I recognise that there are difficulties in building and maintaining a bunker for a single person.
I believe the solo bunker is inherently more dangerous in the long term and should be a last resort if nothing better is available.
One could also teach people the necessary skills, or help them find reliable contractors, supplies, and so forth.
On the topic of finding traffickers, one of my favourite ideas is to set them up by having someone act as a lure with a GPS tracking bracelet and a team following them.
If anyone tries to kidnap them, the team can immediately grab the men responsible.
Or if the lure wants to take the risk, allow them to be taken back to their lair, follow behind, free all the girls, and arrest everyone.
It has a double effect in that it simultaneously takes abusive people off the streets, tests and demonstrates the safety of the neighbourhood, and makes the act of kidnapping women and children more frightening as any of them could be fakes with dozens of men waiting to attack.
I also think the recruitment process would be very fruitful, "Looking for strong men who want to save children and stop pedophiles"
I imagine that there would be a biblical flood of applicants.
The bait part is a bit morally ambiguous, and the strike team might go over board and end up killing people, which would not be a good look. But as a first draft of an idea, I think it's interesting.
The bait would be in danger, but they'd be walking through an area that, officially, ought to be safe yet isn't.
And citizens arrest is legal enough as long as the suspects are not killed while unarmed.
As for the organisation being a nation rather than a charity organisation, perhaps doing both would be advisable.
I think it would be helpful for the group to have an official front organisation, otherwise it'll be easy to paint as a scam or terror group, and hard to find people to donate funds or join as they might be worried about said financial fraud.
You'll also be a lot less likely to come under attack from the media and government if you have established a positive reputation and appear to be following the legal regulations.
"I meant the creation of larger survival bunkers, for at least dozens of people."
—That'd be great to get to the point of having such resources.
"One could also teach people the necessary skills, or help them find reliable contractors, supplies, and so forth."
—yes to this, for sure!
"On the topic of finding traffickers"
—I do not see this as part of the initial mission statement. But getting to a point of being able to consider it as a possibility would be desirable. And it would be a righteous cause/mission, for sure.
"I think it would be helpful for the group to have an official front organisation."
Do you have plans for a chapter on how to get free of nonconceptual government? We have to live somewhere, but there is nowhere on earth that is not under the control of at least one government. I recall parts of a story I read years ago about a rebel of some kind who was tried insurrection and sentenced to a life only onboard a ship, never being allowed on land.
That will occupy much of the penultimate chapter. There are no quick fixes—this will take time (unless we get a deus ex machina of some sort). So we have to get the ball rolling ASAP.
Joel Bowman (& Associates) Would be proud, Christopher. Here's a quote from today's Notes from the end of the world.
"Even a few short years ago, it would have sounded like pie-in-the-sky delusion to suggest lancing these rancid bureauboils, the kind of utopian rhetoric proffered by die-hard libertarians, ne’er-do-well anarchists and fringe-dwelling newsletter writers. (We know... we wrote the letters!)"
"Allodial title to their physical property." I personally think land "ownership" needs to be a thing of the past. What about all the people who don't own land? What about people who live nomadically or semi nomadically? One of my issues when many people talk of a new way of living, is they are ok with it as long as they get to keep everything they obtained through the current civilization. As for the people who have obtained nothing? They usually don't have an answer. It's like they want to keep the hierarchy going so they can continue having more than others. I believe that is why the middle class is so resistant to change. They fear the idea of sharing. Could be wrong, but that's what I see.
Is my house not mine? If it is not mine, then whose house is it?
If it does not belong to me, then to whom does it belong? Someone else? Who would that someone be? Everyone else in the whole world? How does that work?
When all I had was a tent and my car, and I was living on the road, driving around Montana, was that tent not mine? If not, whose was it?
An Amazing Chapter Christopher: "No one ever asked for our consent. Governments simply lie and say we consented to their rule, when we clearly did not. And then they proceed to violate our rights, each and every day. Our moral premise, our commandment, is that this should never happen to anyone."
And I give you a Special Thanks and much Respect because you gave credit where credit was due, in this case to Neal Stephenson "It was this vision that first set my mind alight . . . ". This tells me you are a True Leader who gives proper credit and does not Usurp others. To me the Usurper (Who Usurped the Divine God) caused all the mess we have had since time began. In my field I see Usurpers all the time.
Thank you, Albert. We all learn so much from others!
You are Amazing! I know of only a living or recent few people who have the kind of pen you have!
It doesn't always come easy, but it must come. There is work to be done!
Your right but wading through the dross and BS is very tiring.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DCVmBDFtY_r/?igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
HOW DOES THIS HAPPEN?🤬
SHUT DOWN THE FDA NOW!
I cannot watch IG reels at the moment. What is it?
ARCTIC APPLES GENETICALLY ENGINEERED US AND CANADA
FDA APPROVED 🤬
Arctic apples? Like, grown north of the 60?
Not informed, and no consent, only bullying.
💯
That is the pure arrogance of government as they treat the citizens like they are the same numbskulls that actually do run the government. We are not as we see the folly in believing any government is good for us.
The reason they never ask for consent is because many would say no and that would undermine their tyranny. The same with mRNA poisons, WHO and the UN. Even if you say no, they ignore you and proceed with more terrorism. We have reached our limits.
We. have. reached. our. limits.
Consent? What is this mythical word mean? We are born into the country we belong to. We are given no choice as to how it's run, how it treats people, or how it makes rules.
It reminds me of the lyrics from an old song.
And when the sky darkens and the prospect is war
Who's given a gun and then pushed to the fore?
And expected to die for the land of our birth
Though we've never owned one lousy handful of earth.
I'd rather live where I want, surrounded by like minded people, and be able to contribute to the rules of said place. But we aren't given that choice.
Then we will have to slowly, patiently, claw our way to a world where we DO have that choice.
It won't happen tomorrow, but someone has to get it started. Our grandchildren will thank us.
And so My work to that end!
Escape the Cave! (article): https://amaterasusolar.substack.com/p/escape-the-cave
I like your choice of "distributed nation" as a brief designation for our concept of intentional communities based on true consent. Some try to claim the us constitution is a contract. However I know of no genuine contract that you can be threatened with coercive force if you try to exit it, and it is going to cost you plenty. A good contract should plainly state what the penalties are for dissolving it if any before you ever sign on the dotted line. I don't recall doing that.
Jefferson's famous "consent of the governed" is twisted to mean the consent of the majority, this is "the people," yet even that is a lie, since there was never even a choice of whether you wanted to be a party to it, and no winning national vote I ever saw actually was provably the majority of the whole population, nor does the majority actually select these people who supposedly run to represent (the supposed majority of) us.
And even if it did have an actual majority, it is by some slender margin like most of the electoral races this election season. It means almost half the people get forced to accept what the other 51% wanted, if you assume the 51% even really knew any of these people they voted for and knew they would actually do what the 51% want. Once (s)elected they seem to do pretty much what the well paid lobbyists pay (bribe) them to do.
Amen let the kids be kids
That's all we ask.
To my mind the biggest problem is not acknowledging the true expanse of the term “Theft”
Theft of the truth is theft by deception or false narratives.
Theft of what’s not yours , be these an others ideas or possessions.
Theft of a life or another’s health by direct or indirect means .
Theft of the true nature of the self and gaslighting others to accept a lie , mistruth or manipulation of truth using “ experts say” .
Adoption of the Law of one .
Now build a society having the above logic and heart connected. Good luck …
Thou shall not steal should encompass all the above definitions. This is an old idea . It isn’t mine but it should be the first law .
I entirely agree that every moral MUST-NOT transgression can be framed as a theft or a kind of theft. But "thou shalt not steal" in and of itself does not send as complete message as our first protocol, as written. It can easily be misread to exclude some of those transgressions. Whereas the first protocol, as written, is harder to misinterpret. (Although admittedly not as pithy!)
Just as everything can be framed as theft, everything can be framed as a violation of consent. Indeed, if you come over and take my pruning saw from the garage with my permission, then it is not theft. If I ask my wife to lie to me and tell me I am handsome when I clearly am not, then it is lying, but there is no wrong, since I consented. Consent seems to be the top level concern…
I like your reasoning:)
Thank you. I have been grinding away pretty hard at it!
I had a thought too along the lines of Governments are the thieves of your consent at birth by issuing a birth certificate whereas your mother signs your straw-man contract for your legal fiction to give them consent over you . Keep toiling you make brilliant arguments:)
Thank you. Others have done great work on the subject of birth certificates, tacit contracts, unrefuted affidavits, jurisdictions, etc. I know next to nothing on the subject. But I do plan to try to explore this area and see if there is anything we can do in that regard.
Distributed polity?
I considered it. But “nation” just has more juice somehow. I like the word polity, but nation seems to encompass something bigger. Some of this is, of course, just a matter of taste and perception. But “nation” does also have the advantage of being a more familiar word. Thanks for considering the question!
Cheers for diving into the etymology of "nation" and trying to reassert a different connotation.
> But we cannot just be against things; we must also stand for something.
My very first Substack article was about that. So important to get the basics!
Thanks, DS.
I also perceive, and am grateful for, your classy choice of referring to an earlier piece but not linking to it. I am fine with posting pertinent links to one's own work—it makes sense for all of us to do it once in a while. But some people post links in every single comment. Not doing that seems the classier and more respectful choice.
Good piece—I read it and subscribed.
Thanks much, Sir!
It can be awkward to know how many links and how often to throw them into comments, whether or not they're links to my work. I sometimes think I link too much, too frequently.
On a related note, are you lining up any podcast appearances as DN progresses? The Bad Roman? Others?
Yes, it is always a question. We all have info to impart, and a certain amount of self-promotion is inevitable and reasonable. I think it is easy enough to tell when it goes overboard, though. And you never do :-)
I am hoping to go back to doing appearances in late winter. Writing this installments is keeping me too busy already—I have little time for anything else. It'll be better to do it once the intense writing is over and I have a completed product to discuss. (I sure hope it can be done by late winter!)
I know you've already chosen the name, but if you ever change your mind wouldn't "charity" work.
Something like "Human Liberation Charity"
Since the goal is to work for the freedom of the human race, a clear social benefit, it could be classified as a charity. And the word has good connotations.
Under this banner you can also fight sexual slavery, human trafficking, and similar. Earning the organisation a positive reputation as saviours, and providing a source of recruits both from the saved victims and from people who want to help save others.
At the same time, this protection from enslavement can be afforded to the members themselves. In the form of, for instance, spreading knowledge of lasting tax efficient structures, networking with similar groups, and credit unions.
One could also build survival bunkers with huge supply stocks and hydroponics justifying it as preparation for climate change.
Whether or not you believe in it doesn't matter.
The availability of a safe haven for members to retreat to during disasters will greatly increase their loyalty to the movement and the difficulty of external entities from applying pressure and physical threats.
Very interesting thoughts!
When you suggest "survival bunkers," do you mean individuals doing their own, or do you mean somehow making them for lots of members to use?
I love the idea of spreading knowledge internally. That is definitely part of the plan.
I had not given much thought to specific campaigns of external action (fighting sexual trafficking, e.g.). More just to the general notion of being well-behaved and setting a peerless example. I will have to give that more thought.
On the name: I get the idea you are going for, but the noun "charity" isn't strong enough, and denotatively, it diverges and misleads from the actual nature of the the thing. IOW, it makes it sound like a charity rather than a nation. A "charity" might just be an organization, whereas this is actually a new kind of nation. Know what I mean, Jellybean?
I meant the creation of larger survival bunkers, for at least dozens of people.
I'm not against people having their own individual bunkers, far from it, but I recognise that there are difficulties in building and maintaining a bunker for a single person.
I believe the solo bunker is inherently more dangerous in the long term and should be a last resort if nothing better is available.
One could also teach people the necessary skills, or help them find reliable contractors, supplies, and so forth.
On the topic of finding traffickers, one of my favourite ideas is to set them up by having someone act as a lure with a GPS tracking bracelet and a team following them.
If anyone tries to kidnap them, the team can immediately grab the men responsible.
Or if the lure wants to take the risk, allow them to be taken back to their lair, follow behind, free all the girls, and arrest everyone.
It has a double effect in that it simultaneously takes abusive people off the streets, tests and demonstrates the safety of the neighbourhood, and makes the act of kidnapping women and children more frightening as any of them could be fakes with dozens of men waiting to attack.
I also think the recruitment process would be very fruitful, "Looking for strong men who want to save children and stop pedophiles"
I imagine that there would be a biblical flood of applicants.
The bait part is a bit morally ambiguous, and the strike team might go over board and end up killing people, which would not be a good look. But as a first draft of an idea, I think it's interesting.
The bait would be in danger, but they'd be walking through an area that, officially, ought to be safe yet isn't.
And citizens arrest is legal enough as long as the suspects are not killed while unarmed.
As for the organisation being a nation rather than a charity organisation, perhaps doing both would be advisable.
I think it would be helpful for the group to have an official front organisation, otherwise it'll be easy to paint as a scam or terror group, and hard to find people to donate funds or join as they might be worried about said financial fraud.
You'll also be a lot less likely to come under attack from the media and government if you have established a positive reputation and appear to be following the legal regulations.
"I meant the creation of larger survival bunkers, for at least dozens of people."
—That'd be great to get to the point of having such resources.
"One could also teach people the necessary skills, or help them find reliable contractors, supplies, and so forth."
—yes to this, for sure!
"On the topic of finding traffickers"
—I do not see this as part of the initial mission statement. But getting to a point of being able to consider it as a possibility would be desirable. And it would be a righteous cause/mission, for sure.
"I think it would be helpful for the group to have an official front organisation."
—Here is my post from yesterday: https://christophercook.substack.com/p/alliance-human-independence
Alliance for Human Independence.
Ah, I forgot that so quickly. Apologies. I agree with everything then.
I hope I can join when it arrives.
Then let us see to it that it arrives!
Do you have plans for a chapter on how to get free of nonconceptual government? We have to live somewhere, but there is nowhere on earth that is not under the control of at least one government. I recall parts of a story I read years ago about a rebel of some kind who was tried insurrection and sentenced to a life only onboard a ship, never being allowed on land.
That will occupy much of the penultimate chapter. There are no quick fixes—this will take time (unless we get a deus ex machina of some sort). So we have to get the ball rolling ASAP.
Love it Christopher!!! Thank you!
👏👏👏
Joel Bowman (& Associates) Would be proud, Christopher. Here's a quote from today's Notes from the end of the world.
"Even a few short years ago, it would have sounded like pie-in-the-sky delusion to suggest lancing these rancid bureauboils, the kind of utopian rhetoric proffered by die-hard libertarians, ne’er-do-well anarchists and fringe-dwelling newsletter writers. (We know... we wrote the letters!)"
And cross-referencing your fellow Substackian(s): Source
https://open.substack.com/pub/joelbowman/p/a-threat-to-bureaucracy
Good stuff!
"Allodial title to their physical property." I personally think land "ownership" needs to be a thing of the past. What about all the people who don't own land? What about people who live nomadically or semi nomadically? One of my issues when many people talk of a new way of living, is they are ok with it as long as they get to keep everything they obtained through the current civilization. As for the people who have obtained nothing? They usually don't have an answer. It's like they want to keep the hierarchy going so they can continue having more than others. I believe that is why the middle class is so resistant to change. They fear the idea of sharing. Could be wrong, but that's what I see.
I will begin covering this subject in detail in a few days. I touch on it here and elsewhere: https://christophercook.substack.com/p/you-island-archipelago-sovereign-individual-private-property-rights
Is my house not mine? If it is not mine, then whose house is it?
If it does not belong to me, then to whom does it belong? Someone else? Who would that someone be? Everyone else in the whole world? How does that work?
When all I had was a tent and my car, and I was living on the road, driving around Montana, was that tent not mine? If not, whose was it?