Practical Problems with Revolutions

Time is on your side. Most of 'the people' are not. (DN 5.5)

Regular readers—especially those involved with the distributed nation project—will have by now perceived that I am being very thorough in making the argument that initiating a revolution is not the right choice. To wit,

We Won’t Be Launching a Violent Revolution
It Would Be Hypocritical to Impose Our Will on Others
Who Would Be the Targets in a Revolution?
Is This Who We Want to Become?
(and an earlier piece, Militias and Bloody Revolutions Are Not the Way to Go)

Yes, revolutions have a long pedigree in human affairs, oppressors deserve to be overthrown, and all involuntary governance is morally impermissible. But it is still not the best choice.

I will complete this piece, along with two more on the same subject, and then we will move on.

Among the arguments we have not yet discussed is the practical question: could an initiated revolution even be successful? This is a complex topic that would undoubtedly invite a great deal of speculation.

Personally, I am skeptical of the possibilities of success, but since there are many unknowns on that front, I won’t offer too much analysis. Instead, I will offer just a few thoughts on the edge of that question.

More enemies than friends

Today’s powers that be aren’t pushovers. Yes, there are “more of us than there are of them.” But how many of us are there, really?

It is easy, when one’s personal circle is made up of liberty-loving people, to feel like there are a lot of us. But there aren’t as many as you might think. A majority are uninterested, unaware, or solidly unfriendly to the freedom movement:

• Some are afraid of their own shadows and want a strong state. Any other notion is terrifying to them.

• Some want to keep the handouts coming, whether it’s welfare or special treatment for crony corporations.

• Some are indifferent, but will side with the state against anyone who is perceived as causing disorder.

• Some love the state. Everyone left of center, for example, is calling for a larger, more active state, not a smaller one. (This is true even if they are not aware of it, and despite whatever bluster they emit about ‘freedom’ and ‘rights.’ Leftism is a large-state phenomenon.)

A plurality of any population tends to favor government by default. And a majority hate chaos and disorder.

In that sense, there really aren’t “more of us than there are of them.” Even if people outside of government outnumber people inside government, that doesn’t mean they’d be on your side.

Not your great-great-great grandfather’s oppressor

This also isn’t April 1775. Your enemy is not on the other side of an ocean, and simultaneously bogged down in two other wars in India, as the Mother Country was during the American Revolution.

Technology and surveillance are force multipliers. Combat is more complicated than it was. This is the case in America and every other developed nation.

Yes, asymmetric warfare can work. But thus far, its most significant successes have come when large swaths of people are involved in fighting a foreign enemy.

Such guerrillas and partisans have also been accustomed to living primitive, hardscrabble lifestyles. And, in fighting a hated foreign enemy, they have the support of most people, which means they can expect aid and cover from townsfolk, rather than being turned in by them.

A revolution launched against a domestic government in a developed country would lack those advantages.

Martyrdom is pointless

Without a decent amount of support among the general populace, a modern revolution has little prospect of success. A few hundred revolutionaries would just end up getting Waco’d or RubyRidged. Even a few hundred thousand would be up against not only the military, but their neighbors and nearly every institution in and out of government.

There are scenarios in which things would be different; for example, if

• the government or military were to split into camps,

• things were to deteriorate to the point where the general public’s sentiments shifted, or

• the government were to collapse completely.

Of course, in those cases, you would not need to plan anything—events would unfold on their own, with or without you.

A few million might be able to succeed, but then with numbers like that, we will have other options. Better options.

Revolution in a single country does not get rid of the transnational psychos

Let us stipulate, for the sake of argument, something that many people in the freedom movement already believe: that in addition to whatever problems each population has with its domestic government, there are also transnational shadow powers pulling strings behind the scenes.

A domestic revolution, even if successful, would do nothing to any such powers.

Even if a regime friendly to such powers (think Justin Trudeau in Canada) were replaced by a somewhat defiant regime (Orban, Meloni, et al), what has really been accomplished? It adds more sandbags to the levee, but the water is still rising. Meanwhile, statist forces within any country continue doing all they can to let that water back in.

If we truly want to overcome or escape domestic and international sources of oppression, we must establish an alternate base of power. A new kind of power. That will take time.

Don’t give them the excuse they want.

The state is violence. Violence is the only tool in their toolkit. Violence is what they know.

Using violence puts us in their world. But we are building a new world.

If we were to become violent, it would not only put us in their world (an ugly place to be)—it would also give them exactly the excuse they want to destroy us.

You’ve seen the power of the media. They can turn any lie into dogma and get a majority of people to believe it as incontrovertible truth. And some, once convinced, will never be shaken from that belief no matter how much contrary evidence is eventually presented.

Imagine what a hostile government AND media would do to a group of revolutionaries today.

Fighting on that ground just puts you exactly where they want you—in a realm they can understand and deal with. It gives them all the excuse they need to silence you forever.

Flinging oneself in mad opposition to a brick wall does nothing to hurt the brick wall. We must be smarter than that.

The goal is not martyrdom, performative gestures, or a brief blaze of glory. The goal is to win. If we can outwit and outlast them, then we can eventually achieve the freedom and independence we want (or at least create the conditions by which our descendants can achieve it).

They’re not just going to let us go. However, government officials are also short-sighted, and so is the system they serve. Thus, we must stretch out the timeline. Develop long-term goals. Think generationally. Ten years. One hundred years. More.

Time is on our side, not theirs.

---

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 || Who: 4.0 | 4.1 | 4.2 | 4.3 | 4.4 | 4.5 | 4.XX | 4.XY | 4.6 | 4.7 | 4.8 | 4.9 | 4.10 | 4.11 | 4.12 | 4.XZ | 4.13 | 4.YX | 4.14 | 4.15 | 4.16 | 4.17 | 4.18 | 4.19 | 4.YY | 4.YZ | 4.ZX | 4.20 | 4.21 | 4.22 || How: 5.0 | 5.1 | 5.2 | 5.3 | 5.4 | 5.5