Sadly, humans' nature as an ultra-social species always leads some to insist that collectivism is the only option. "But but but…you can't leave. Yes, even if that means getting forced to do things you don't want to do. Because you can't leave. No one leaves." Sigh.
Similarly, at what point does the will of the "minority" matter? As an easy example, three coworkers wanna go have lunch. Let's vote; burgers, pizza, or Mexican? The odd man out, doesn't really matter, right? It's lunch after all.
OK, but what about when the "minority" happens to be 335 million, divided by two, minus one? (i.e., approximately half of the population of the USA)
Is it legitimate to negate the will of 167,499,499 people because 167,500,000 want something different? Apparently some people believe that to be the case. I don't.
If you don't think that sounds OK, then at what point does the will of minority matter or not? And to what extent is it OK to override their will?
Coercive civil authority is inherently, intrinsically evil. There's no such thing as "getting the right people" in charge of fundamental, inescapable violence.
Yep, right, democracy sucks, but as oft said, consider the alternatives. They all suck and frankly I suspect consent, common law, Libertarianism, Anarcho-capitalism as the state of any state would soon suck with Blackrock, or a warlord by any other name atop and all us neath it's heel.
Saying that as I've noted before, more and more I lean Anarcho-capitalist. Caesar will always be there and give unto him, grudgingly, niggardly, the least of the wheat, the worst of the meat, and as little as possible.
Meanwhile rack at the branch, anarcho-capitalize, consensualy trade on the sly, get comfortable, while appearing to to Caesar to just be getting by, a quietly stated freedom within any state.
Thought-provoking stuff as always, Chris! I thought of you while watching this season, especially the part where the gun-toting guards overseeing the "games" explain how they "value your willing participation" before conducting one of the votes haha. To quote the late, great Jack Karlson: "Gentlemen! This... is... democracy manifest!"
Wow! I had no idea other people were finally talking about this seriously. Nobody ever has been willing to engage with me on the idea that democracy itself is a sham. Not even libertarians with whom I think I most closely align but, really, I don't align with any political ideology.
Democracy is a fairy tale. It's what you tell a class of kindergarteners, something like, "today kids, we get to vote on whether we do finger painting or make stick people. YAAAAY!"
People immediately assume that, if you're against the concept of democracy, then surely you must be a communist or socialist or something. I'm none of the above. They're all bad ideas and just coincidentally (I'm sure) all of these ideologies *including* democracy have been wonderful tools of murderous oppression.
Then when I say that I'm just pointing out the farcical nature of the thing because we need to come to terms with it, but I don't have the solution. Well then that is the cue for the remaining people to tune out the conversation. When actually me pointing out the elephant in the room that's been murdering humanity doesn't matter because I have not personally thought of a better way!
I'm pretty freaking sure, there are people much smarter than me than can figure out these big picture ideas and philosophies! I'm a software engineer; I can tell you how to do large scale software engineering projects. I don't know how to solve the problem of democracy being a farce.
So anyway, I'm glad that this is finally gaining traction with people. Maybe one day, enough people will finally come to terms with the basic fact that their wonderful fairy tale of democracy is a miserable, even murderous, oppressive sham, that they've somehow been fooled into believing is some sort of enlightenment.
"Not even libertarians with whom I think I most closely align"
—If so, then they really have not drawn libertarian ideas out to their logical conclusions.
"Democracy is a fairy tale. It's what you tell a class of kindergarteners, something like, "today kids, we get to vote on whether we do finger painting or make stick people."
—Ha! Yes.
"People immediately assume that, if you're against the concept of democracy, then surely you must be a communist or socialist or something."
—Or a fascist or right-wing nationalist or just plain crazy. Yes.
"When actually me pointing out the elephant in the room that's been murdering humanity doesn't matter because I have not personally thought of a better way!"
—YES, so much this. First acknowledge that it is a moral crime. THEN we can talk about the solutions. But instead of answering the moral question, they immediately revert to "So, do you have a better idea?" I think you will very much like this: https://christophercook.substack.com/p/which-basement-want-get-locked-in
As it happens, there is a solution. Monarchy was 1.0. (Kings and nobles decide for you.) Democracy was 2.0. (Majorities decide for you.) In 3.0, YOU decide for you. It's called market anarchism (anarchocapitalism, voluntaryism, etc.) and some very smart people have worked it out in great detail.
I'd have to think about it (re parts of informed consent). I would think the ideas of truth and honesty need to be enshrined as well (and it should be ok to say: we don't know how this affects things etc).
I agree with the RIVET list.
I disagree with market anarchism. Capitalism works best with rules. Unless already known, things like private equity buyouts (and leveraged buyouts) were reintroduced in the 1980s (by Reagan, in a stealthy way) after being banned in the 30s, and Clinton removed the glass-steagal act in 99 just before leaving office. These rules and regulations, implemented in the 30s as a risposte to the 1929 crash, helped tame the greedy feral instincts of finance. Many problems we have today can be traced to intellectually dubious ideas like "trickle down economics" and "laissez faire". If we were more honest it would be easier to get to the truth of things. I'm sure you've heard of Peter Thiel's mantra "competition is for losers", which partly helps inform current bankrupt ideologies of monopolistic tendencies and oligarchic power.
My point is just that it doesn't have to be this way. We simultaneously blame and acclaim capitalism without giving much consideration to the necessity of certain rules for it to function. Moreover, one of the least described inputs into why the West has developed vs other countries that continue to flounder is the legal framework of courts offering recourse to those with claims in relation to contractual obligations. Business needs certainty etc.
Sorry to go on a tangent.
But under a libertarian (or anarchic) system, it's hard to imagine functioning courts and regulations to limit financial creativity, which has secondary cascading negative effects.
If we let the "market" decide, we would be full of poisons that take years to kill us, which is kinda what we have now (Europe is better than the USA in this regard), but it would be worse (think pesticides in food and lead or floride in water, for instance). Market participants are only as good as the rules allow them to get away with. Again this is cultural (greed is good, etc) and spiritual (God is dead).
Our large systems have gone bad, you're right. And radical change is necessary, with a solid footing of "our rights" and less technocratic and bureaucratic control. But I don't see a happy ending minus a catastrophic event that forces the powers that be to stare into the abyss and see the errors of their ways. For us "common people", dodging the crap is the only realistic solution at the moment. I'm not a doomsayer, just that we've gotten ourselves into a fine mess of our own doing and no pain no gain unfortunately.
Yeah, I think things are going to get worse before they get better. But I also think they are going to get better.
As far as market anarchism, first, let me thank you for the calm way that you approached the topic. A lot of people react quite violently to the very word!
Instead of a single entity claiming a monopoly to forcibly impose security and justice within a given territory and upon a captive people, private agencies will peacefully compete in a free and open market to provide security and justice to willing customers.
It is very simple to define, though obviously the details take longer to explain. I have written about it a fair amount, and there is a huge body of literature on the subject. Private courts worked for centuries in Europe, Ireland, and elsewhere, without any involuntary government whatsoever. They continue to work in a limited fashion under existing governments, and without those governments, they would do just fine. But like I say, this is not something that can be rendered convincing in a single paragraph. If you would like to learn more, I am happy to share resources, from short articles to full books.
In the meantime, one thing to consider. Governments CLAIM that they keep business "in check," but do they? Or, on balance, are they far more in cahoots with them—in a mutually beneficial incestuous relationship with them—than any actually keeping in check that they might do?
That is certainly a plausible scenario. I really like Hoppe's rebuttal to this, though. I cannot do it full justice here, but basically…
Security firms will very likely not be small, fly-by-night, hack operations. There might be a few like that, but the tendency will be toward large, well-capitalized aggression insurance agencies trying to maximize profits. Think Coke, Pepsi, and RC, not Joe's Acme Protection Posse.
Having to pay out claims is not profitable, so they will want to maintain peace as much as possible.
They are in competition with other such firms, so they want to attract customers, not lose them.
They themselves must have their own insurance, and no one is going to insure them if their security personnel are behaving like thugs.
Basically, market forces are impelling them to improve quality and lower costs (like market forces do in general). And acting like thugs runs directly counter to that.
Historically, there is precedent. Though I am not an expert in the period by any means, I do know that the Hanseatic League was basically a proto-ancap arrangement that used private armies and private law. They were all about making money; it was not in their interest to go to war with each other. Nothing is conflict free, of course, but their worst troubles, as I understand it, came from other states, not from other members of the League.
We trust the free market to do things better—not perfectly, but better. The argument here is that that can also apply to security and justice. And I think the argument is pretty persuasive.
I wasn't claiming that it would be worse. It is actually a description of what we have, only on a smaller scale. Standing armies are just as likely to create conflict to justify their existence.
The reason we reached where we are now is because people couldn't do what you are describing.
Using violence and deception to obtain wealth is just too effective a strategy.
It's why carnivorous predators evolved.
Corporations like coca cola are immensely corrupt and violent behind the scenes. They indulge in espionage, industrial sabotage, blackmail, bribery, assassinations, propaganda (cynically called public relations) and even mass murder.
It's how they became wealthy in the first place.
They only seem remotely decent because they are very good at public relations. If we had a free and independent media, most megacorporations wouldn't be able to operate at all, the public would be so angry at them that they'd be forced to close.
Which is why they spend so much on it.
If we consider how regulatory agencies act against those they profess to protect, and the ease with which Soros et al can engineer colour revolutions using mass media. Then compare with the leaflet campaign that preceded the French and Russian revolutions, and recall the power of religious institutions, intelligence agencies, the military, arms manufacturers and distributors, banking groups, and others.
I think it's clear that a cartel of media groups, bankers, intelligence officers, merchants of death, celebrity cults and religious leaders would easily subvert everything.
There are billions of people today that believe everything they are told by the epistemic authorities. Many are actually frightened by the idea that there are people who question the information. This, despite the fact that the evidence of historical duplicity is not only available in the public domain, but so incredibly vast that it's difficult to find examples of honesty.
It is like they are drinking raw sewage believing it is a clean pure mountain spring.
How do you intend to prevent such stupid people from being manipulated by clever people working together in highly organised conspiracies?
Everything you say/ask seems quite sensible to me. There is obviously a lot we don't know, since the modern variant of the private-law society has never been tried full scale. So of it, we're just going to have to try it and see. But where I hang my hat is here:
Right now, we have all the factions we have PLUS an entity (governments) whose power is involuntary and inescapable. They can do what they want and you're not allowed to resist. They might work in cahoots with this faction or that. In fact, that is what they generally tend to do (even as they are pretending they are keeping X faction in check.)
If we switched to anarchism, we'd have all the same factions MINUS the faction whose power we did not choose, cannot escape, and are not allowed to resist.
My strong suspicion is that the latter scenario would be better. Still messy, but better.
Does that properly address your question/concern? (Whether you agree or not, I just want to make sure I am doing justice to what you are actually worried about.)
I understand what you are saying, but in my view the official politics we have is just a facade, the public relations wing of the ruling factions of our time.
Removing the face of the operation only reveals the inner workings.
The police won't disappear, they'll rebrand.
A similar point is made in animal farm. They mount a rebellion against the humans, "Two legs bad, four legs good".
But ultimately, the pigs just take their place as the next abusers.
They operate under the colour of freedom, while actually representing slavery and oppression.
The farm animals failed to fight their real enemy, misplaced trust.
As long as they don't know how to think for themselves, gather credible information, build mutual trust, and defend what they care about, they will be abused.
I'll have to read up on your article on anarchism. Replying to another article of yours, the gist of my answer was the default of a superseding authority to regulate internal order because it managed to protect against the external threats. I would still be hard-pressed to argue that the competing private agencies (in your reply) would still be dependent on a benevolent king/aristocrat/state (or federal govt), and the local courts from your example existed in reference to a higher authority, however nominal (vs real) its power was. That said, I understand what you're saying about this conversation format not being ideal to link sources and previous essays. I sometimes explore your previous essays, so I'm assuming it's something I'll come across :)
In terms of "keeping businesses in check", as I've grown older I've concluded it's more of a cat/mouse game of random checks, conflicts of interest (ex lobbying), and scandals creating incentives to regulate or change the rules. In this sense I'd say you're absolutely right, we have the illusion things work in a certain way when actually it's more of an algebraic sum of many parts working independently (for ex. Customs & border checks do sampling checks, testing of food additives and medicines happens after they're introduced to the market with the premise they're not on an existing harmful compounds list, etc).
Yeah, and the FDA approved Thalidomide, and continues to allow us to be doused in glyophosate, when even the Europeans have said no. Government is sloppy at best.
"We will protect against aggression." (10s of millions of war dead, 150 million dead at the hands of leftists, and a few tens of millions more at the hands of non-leftist governments. Close to 400 billion all told, adding together Rummel's numbers with war dead—all in a single century.)
"We will protect against crime." (hundreds of thousands of rapes, murders, assaults and property crimes every year.)
"Only we can build the roads." (Our roads are crap and 40,000 die on the every year.)
I could go on. Obviously we anarchists have some burden of proof, but we cannot go up against a description of government that stylizes and whitewashes what it actually is and does. (Not saying you are doing this; I am just making the point.)
On the subject of consent, I suggest exploring the topic of "informed consent", not just in relation to medications.
Informed consent is about evaluating risks, including worst case, and trying to ascertain the risk profile of the subject undergoing the intervention.
Taking a step back, it's frustrating how the superficiality of our narratives combined with the conflicts of interest (corruption) of the agents involved in games (for ex. Elections) with short-term payoffs leaves us with an ever more fragile system.
Given we don't have a culture with an elevated "council of learned elders" able to choose or influence outcomes wisely in the interests of all, our dystopian reality can't but lead to ever greater catastrophic results (LA fires or current UK freedom of speech laws), which will invariably lead to calls for an authoritarian figure to "fix things" if a singular event is catastrophic enough, and since history rhymes, we know what this will lead to.
Besides learning to dodge the bullet, I don't see realistic solutions. On a macro level all our western countries are bogged down with their respective bureaucracies and constellation of institutions and social webs of relations and conflicts of interest paid for big money. Taken together, it's, change adverse (people who rock the boat exit the stage mostly). If anything, without always referring to conspiracies, this helps explain how it's practically impossible to roll back bad decisions and if anything conspiracy theories helps us digest the ugly truth of us being part of the same mundane and banal system we're critical of.
On the subject of consent, in https://christophercook.substack.com/p/protocols-natural-law, I proposed that consent must be voluntary, informed, explicit, transparent, and revokable. I suppose we could remember that with RIVET (the first letter of each). What do you think—does that cover all that must be covered re: consent?
As to the rest, I see what you are saying. I hate to bang my drum, but it further reinforces, for me, why market anarchism is the way to go. All of these attempts to create large systems, and impose them on large groups in large areas, seem to fail. Let people choose their own course. Let the market offer desirable solutions, and let people choose between them.
Otherwise, when the large system goes bad (and they always do), the bad is forced in everyone. And no one gets to escape it because our societies all have the same belief that large-scale solutions being forcibly imposed on everyone is the only possible way to go.
The Declaration of Independence provides what appear to be the only two possible justifications for government, one explicit and the other implicit. Both are included in this passage: “...to secure these rights [to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness], Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...” In this context, “justification” means the act of showing something (e.g., government) to be just.
The explicit justification given above is consent. If everyone to be governed had given their explicit informed consent to be governed, the government would be justified (subject to certain common law requirements). But most of us have never explicitly given our informed consent to be governed. Nor have we even been shown the courtesy of being asked for our consent, which could easily have been done by sending us a contract every year asking whether we agree to pay certain amounts in return for certain services. I suspect most of us would not agree to pay outrageous prices for most of what the government does.
The implicit justification for government given above is securing rights, which amounts to maintaining justice since an injustice is a violation of a perfect right. A perfect right, as distinguished from an imperfect right, is a right of justice, which is the only type of right that may be justly enforced. Examples include the rights to life, liberty, and property. The maintaining of justice does not require consent. For example, if someone tries to murder you, you need not obtain the aggressor's consent to use force against him to prevent an injustice, If the government were to uphold justice better than any alternative arrangement, the government would for that reason be justified. Unfortunately, most of what the government does is unjust. That is, the government creates more injustice than it prevents—even more than private criminals create. The evidence of which I'm aware indicates that private alternatives that face competition and depend on voluntary payments for services would probably do a better job for much less expense. Consequently, I find myself attracted to anarcho-capitalism.
Since perfection is impossible here on Earth, all we can do is do our best. And I would say that in this regard, “our best” is described as finding the sweet spot at which enjoyment of natural rights is maximized and disruptions thereto are minimized.
The Founders, and the natural lawyers of the century before them, contended that that sweet spot was to be found with some sort of “limited” government. I used to buy that argument. I do not anymore.
First, and most importantly, because I do not believe it is necessary to violate rights in order to “secure” them. And second because no such “limited” government, even if it were justified and necessary (it isn’t), can be kept limited.
As You know... I have gotten it quite well and long ago! Thank You for Your brilliant work!
Not sure why You're stepping back from the web... I would too, but that I need the web to share awareness that We do not need to live in poverty with moneyed psychopaths in control - but We need enough of Us standing sovereign, and We need free energy tech out in the open.
I am not sure what you mean about stepping back from the web. Oh, you mean reducing my social media footprint? Yeah, that just means leaving LinkedIn, Pinterest, Gab, Twitter, and Facebook. LinkedIn is garbage and fedposters. Pinterest just feeds me pictures of pretty girls and conversion vans (both of which are nice, but not really essential to my daily fight for freedom). Gab is meh, plus lots of anti-Jewish stuff. Twitter has become an engagement farm, and despite Musk's fancy words, there is still a ton of censorship there. And Facebook—don't even get me started on Facebook.
I too like spreading awareness, but my ability to do so on those platforms was throttled years ago to the point of irrelevance. So for those reasons, I'm out.
Ah, fair enough. Those specific outlets indeed suck! I rather like MeWe... I am not shadow banned like I am on X-Twatter (and Bluesky - which took 7 days to shadow ban Me! LOL! SomeOne does not want My work spread...), I don't see anyOne arguing there about "It's the Jews," like, as You say, Gab is replete with, and I never signed up for Pinterest or farcebook.
Linkedin I signed up for right when it first started, but never visit.
Yeah, so far I have had no issues on MeWe. Been on there for... 3, 4 years? A fair while with no indication of shadow banning.
You actually bothered with Bluesky? LOL. I am surprised it took them even 7 days. Most lefties—their rhetoric to the contrary notwithstanding—don't want actual freedom.
I heard little about BS, and as I am looking for places to offer My work, I thought I would give it a shot. Now I have a place to drop My links in case someOne looks Me up there. Haha!
Yeah, MeWe is not the worst. I do get lots of interaction on My comments, and an occasional interaction on My posts. With a fair few holding My view.
And... An occasional "It's the Jews" and a lot of People agree when I say, "No it isn't. They're just the scapegoats."
I have never watched squid games, the movie. I don't want to either. Ever since that giant squid thing in the movie "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea" they have kind of terrified me. The word itself is kind of squidish or is that squeamish. They seem like the strangest creatures to me. Kind of like leftists.
Most of what I know in Korean would get my face slapped. A couple of phrases told to me by a hair and makeup gal on a set, which I asked as I was quasi-flirting with her, and one thing that a couple of Korean dudes working at my local convenience store told me to say, followed by "But don't say that to anyone." I still don't quite know what it means.
Indeed.
No one asking the basic questions:
If a region can hold a vote for its independence, why can't a city, a town, a village, a family, or a single individual?
How many people must be involved in a vote for it to be legitimate?
Why must it be everyone in the land?
These are the right questions to ask!
Sadly, humans' nature as an ultra-social species always leads some to insist that collectivism is the only option. "But but but…you can't leave. Yes, even if that means getting forced to do things you don't want to do. Because you can't leave. No one leaves." Sigh.
You’re on it. “How many people must be involved in a vote for it to be legitimate?” The answer is one. I do not consent.
"I do not consent."
The four most beautiful words in the English language.
Similarly, at what point does the will of the "minority" matter? As an easy example, three coworkers wanna go have lunch. Let's vote; burgers, pizza, or Mexican? The odd man out, doesn't really matter, right? It's lunch after all.
OK, but what about when the "minority" happens to be 335 million, divided by two, minus one? (i.e., approximately half of the population of the USA)
Is it legitimate to negate the will of 167,499,499 people because 167,500,000 want something different? Apparently some people believe that to be the case. I don't.
If you don't think that sounds OK, then at what point does the will of minority matter or not? And to what extent is it OK to override their will?
It wouldn't be legitimate even if it is 334,999,999 to 1.
If it violates the rights of 1 in any way, then it is a moral crime.
Coercive civil authority is inherently, intrinsically evil. There's no such thing as "getting the right people" in charge of fundamental, inescapable violence.
Man, that is such a good way to put it!
Yep, right, democracy sucks, but as oft said, consider the alternatives. They all suck and frankly I suspect consent, common law, Libertarianism, Anarcho-capitalism as the state of any state would soon suck with Blackrock, or a warlord by any other name atop and all us neath it's heel.
Saying that as I've noted before, more and more I lean Anarcho-capitalist. Caesar will always be there and give unto him, grudgingly, niggardly, the least of the wheat, the worst of the meat, and as little as possible.
Meanwhile rack at the branch, anarcho-capitalize, consensualy trade on the sly, get comfortable, while appearing to to Caesar to just be getting by, a quietly stated freedom within any state.
Well said all around.
I certainly don’t think anything ancap will be perfect. Just better.
And the way I do the Blackrock calculus is this…
Governments say that they keep corporations in check, but they don’t really. Rather, they are in cahoots with them.
So, if my choice is corporations on their own, subject to market forces,
or
corporations + central banks + governments that can serve as power vectors to impose a corporation’s will upon us,
I will gladly take the former!
Thought-provoking stuff as always, Chris! I thought of you while watching this season, especially the part where the gun-toting guards overseeing the "games" explain how they "value your willing participation" before conducting one of the votes haha. To quote the late, great Jack Karlson: "Gentlemen! This... is... democracy manifest!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PeihcfYft9w
And yes, I howled at that point in Squid Games!
I think I may need to have a succulent Chinese meal in his honor!
I see you know your Judo well!
Epic.
Wow! I had no idea other people were finally talking about this seriously. Nobody ever has been willing to engage with me on the idea that democracy itself is a sham. Not even libertarians with whom I think I most closely align but, really, I don't align with any political ideology.
Democracy is a fairy tale. It's what you tell a class of kindergarteners, something like, "today kids, we get to vote on whether we do finger painting or make stick people. YAAAAY!"
People immediately assume that, if you're against the concept of democracy, then surely you must be a communist or socialist or something. I'm none of the above. They're all bad ideas and just coincidentally (I'm sure) all of these ideologies *including* democracy have been wonderful tools of murderous oppression.
Then when I say that I'm just pointing out the farcical nature of the thing because we need to come to terms with it, but I don't have the solution. Well then that is the cue for the remaining people to tune out the conversation. When actually me pointing out the elephant in the room that's been murdering humanity doesn't matter because I have not personally thought of a better way!
I'm pretty freaking sure, there are people much smarter than me than can figure out these big picture ideas and philosophies! I'm a software engineer; I can tell you how to do large scale software engineering projects. I don't know how to solve the problem of democracy being a farce.
So anyway, I'm glad that this is finally gaining traction with people. Maybe one day, enough people will finally come to terms with the basic fact that their wonderful fairy tale of democracy is a miserable, even murderous, oppressive sham, that they've somehow been fooled into believing is some sort of enlightenment.
"Not even libertarians with whom I think I most closely align"
—If so, then they really have not drawn libertarian ideas out to their logical conclusions.
"Democracy is a fairy tale. It's what you tell a class of kindergarteners, something like, "today kids, we get to vote on whether we do finger painting or make stick people."
—Ha! Yes.
"People immediately assume that, if you're against the concept of democracy, then surely you must be a communist or socialist or something."
—Or a fascist or right-wing nationalist or just plain crazy. Yes.
"When actually me pointing out the elephant in the room that's been murdering humanity doesn't matter because I have not personally thought of a better way!"
—YES, so much this. First acknowledge that it is a moral crime. THEN we can talk about the solutions. But instead of answering the moral question, they immediately revert to "So, do you have a better idea?" I think you will very much like this: https://christophercook.substack.com/p/which-basement-want-get-locked-in
As it happens, there is a solution. Monarchy was 1.0. (Kings and nobles decide for you.) Democracy was 2.0. (Majorities decide for you.) In 3.0, YOU decide for you. It's called market anarchism (anarchocapitalism, voluntaryism, etc.) and some very smart people have worked it out in great detail.
I'd have to think about it (re parts of informed consent). I would think the ideas of truth and honesty need to be enshrined as well (and it should be ok to say: we don't know how this affects things etc).
I agree with the RIVET list.
I disagree with market anarchism. Capitalism works best with rules. Unless already known, things like private equity buyouts (and leveraged buyouts) were reintroduced in the 1980s (by Reagan, in a stealthy way) after being banned in the 30s, and Clinton removed the glass-steagal act in 99 just before leaving office. These rules and regulations, implemented in the 30s as a risposte to the 1929 crash, helped tame the greedy feral instincts of finance. Many problems we have today can be traced to intellectually dubious ideas like "trickle down economics" and "laissez faire". If we were more honest it would be easier to get to the truth of things. I'm sure you've heard of Peter Thiel's mantra "competition is for losers", which partly helps inform current bankrupt ideologies of monopolistic tendencies and oligarchic power.
My point is just that it doesn't have to be this way. We simultaneously blame and acclaim capitalism without giving much consideration to the necessity of certain rules for it to function. Moreover, one of the least described inputs into why the West has developed vs other countries that continue to flounder is the legal framework of courts offering recourse to those with claims in relation to contractual obligations. Business needs certainty etc.
Sorry to go on a tangent.
But under a libertarian (or anarchic) system, it's hard to imagine functioning courts and regulations to limit financial creativity, which has secondary cascading negative effects.
If we let the "market" decide, we would be full of poisons that take years to kill us, which is kinda what we have now (Europe is better than the USA in this regard), but it would be worse (think pesticides in food and lead or floride in water, for instance). Market participants are only as good as the rules allow them to get away with. Again this is cultural (greed is good, etc) and spiritual (God is dead).
Our large systems have gone bad, you're right. And radical change is necessary, with a solid footing of "our rights" and less technocratic and bureaucratic control. But I don't see a happy ending minus a catastrophic event that forces the powers that be to stare into the abyss and see the errors of their ways. For us "common people", dodging the crap is the only realistic solution at the moment. I'm not a doomsayer, just that we've gotten ourselves into a fine mess of our own doing and no pain no gain unfortunately.
Yeah, I think things are going to get worse before they get better. But I also think they are going to get better.
As far as market anarchism, first, let me thank you for the calm way that you approached the topic. A lot of people react quite violently to the very word!
Market anarchism isn't really what you described, though. It isn't a free-for-all or chaos. All it does is remove involuntary government from the equation. As I note here (https://christophercook.substack.com/p/four-definitions-word-anarchy), it is a condition wherein
Instead of a single entity claiming a monopoly to forcibly impose security and justice within a given territory and upon a captive people, private agencies will peacefully compete in a free and open market to provide security and justice to willing customers.
It is very simple to define, though obviously the details take longer to explain. I have written about it a fair amount, and there is a huge body of literature on the subject. Private courts worked for centuries in Europe, Ireland, and elsewhere, without any involuntary government whatsoever. They continue to work in a limited fashion under existing governments, and without those governments, they would do just fine. But like I say, this is not something that can be rendered convincing in a single paragraph. If you would like to learn more, I am happy to share resources, from short articles to full books.
In the meantime, one thing to consider. Governments CLAIM that they keep business "in check," but do they? Or, on balance, are they far more in cahoots with them—in a mutually beneficial incestuous relationship with them—than any actually keeping in check that they might do?
It's unlikely that private security firms and mercenary groups will compete peacefully.
It's much more likely that they have urban battles with eachother like gangs vying for dominance.
I've seen men fight over a spilled drink.
A group of trigger happy soldiers bored of standing around will eventually create trouble to amuse themselves even if nothing is happening.
So much the more true when stacks of cash are involved.
Here is some further argumentation on this subject: https://christophercook.substack.com/p/people-allowed-own-nuclear-weapons
TL;DR there is no way that private firms will ever match the level of carnage committed by governments.
That is certainly a plausible scenario. I really like Hoppe's rebuttal to this, though. I cannot do it full justice here, but basically…
Security firms will very likely not be small, fly-by-night, hack operations. There might be a few like that, but the tendency will be toward large, well-capitalized aggression insurance agencies trying to maximize profits. Think Coke, Pepsi, and RC, not Joe's Acme Protection Posse.
Having to pay out claims is not profitable, so they will want to maintain peace as much as possible.
They are in competition with other such firms, so they want to attract customers, not lose them.
They themselves must have their own insurance, and no one is going to insure them if their security personnel are behaving like thugs.
Basically, market forces are impelling them to improve quality and lower costs (like market forces do in general). And acting like thugs runs directly counter to that.
Historically, there is precedent. Though I am not an expert in the period by any means, I do know that the Hanseatic League was basically a proto-ancap arrangement that used private armies and private law. They were all about making money; it was not in their interest to go to war with each other. Nothing is conflict free, of course, but their worst troubles, as I understand it, came from other states, not from other members of the League.
We trust the free market to do things better—not perfectly, but better. The argument here is that that can also apply to security and justice. And I think the argument is pretty persuasive.
I wasn't claiming that it would be worse. It is actually a description of what we have, only on a smaller scale. Standing armies are just as likely to create conflict to justify their existence.
The reason we reached where we are now is because people couldn't do what you are describing.
Using violence and deception to obtain wealth is just too effective a strategy.
It's why carnivorous predators evolved.
Corporations like coca cola are immensely corrupt and violent behind the scenes. They indulge in espionage, industrial sabotage, blackmail, bribery, assassinations, propaganda (cynically called public relations) and even mass murder.
It's how they became wealthy in the first place.
They only seem remotely decent because they are very good at public relations. If we had a free and independent media, most megacorporations wouldn't be able to operate at all, the public would be so angry at them that they'd be forced to close.
Which is why they spend so much on it.
If we consider how regulatory agencies act against those they profess to protect, and the ease with which Soros et al can engineer colour revolutions using mass media. Then compare with the leaflet campaign that preceded the French and Russian revolutions, and recall the power of religious institutions, intelligence agencies, the military, arms manufacturers and distributors, banking groups, and others.
I think it's clear that a cartel of media groups, bankers, intelligence officers, merchants of death, celebrity cults and religious leaders would easily subvert everything.
There are billions of people today that believe everything they are told by the epistemic authorities. Many are actually frightened by the idea that there are people who question the information. This, despite the fact that the evidence of historical duplicity is not only available in the public domain, but so incredibly vast that it's difficult to find examples of honesty.
It is like they are drinking raw sewage believing it is a clean pure mountain spring.
How do you intend to prevent such stupid people from being manipulated by clever people working together in highly organised conspiracies?
Or concisely, "What to do about factionalism?"
Everything you say/ask seems quite sensible to me. There is obviously a lot we don't know, since the modern variant of the private-law society has never been tried full scale. So of it, we're just going to have to try it and see. But where I hang my hat is here:
Right now, we have all the factions we have PLUS an entity (governments) whose power is involuntary and inescapable. They can do what they want and you're not allowed to resist. They might work in cahoots with this faction or that. In fact, that is what they generally tend to do (even as they are pretending they are keeping X faction in check.)
If we switched to anarchism, we'd have all the same factions MINUS the faction whose power we did not choose, cannot escape, and are not allowed to resist.
My strong suspicion is that the latter scenario would be better. Still messy, but better.
Does that properly address your question/concern? (Whether you agree or not, I just want to make sure I am doing justice to what you are actually worried about.)
I understand what you are saying, but in my view the official politics we have is just a facade, the public relations wing of the ruling factions of our time.
Removing the face of the operation only reveals the inner workings.
The police won't disappear, they'll rebrand.
A similar point is made in animal farm. They mount a rebellion against the humans, "Two legs bad, four legs good".
But ultimately, the pigs just take their place as the next abusers.
They operate under the colour of freedom, while actually representing slavery and oppression.
The farm animals failed to fight their real enemy, misplaced trust.
As long as they don't know how to think for themselves, gather credible information, build mutual trust, and defend what they care about, they will be abused.
I'll have to read up on your article on anarchism. Replying to another article of yours, the gist of my answer was the default of a superseding authority to regulate internal order because it managed to protect against the external threats. I would still be hard-pressed to argue that the competing private agencies (in your reply) would still be dependent on a benevolent king/aristocrat/state (or federal govt), and the local courts from your example existed in reference to a higher authority, however nominal (vs real) its power was. That said, I understand what you're saying about this conversation format not being ideal to link sources and previous essays. I sometimes explore your previous essays, so I'm assuming it's something I'll come across :)
In terms of "keeping businesses in check", as I've grown older I've concluded it's more of a cat/mouse game of random checks, conflicts of interest (ex lobbying), and scandals creating incentives to regulate or change the rules. In this sense I'd say you're absolutely right, we have the illusion things work in a certain way when actually it's more of an algebraic sum of many parts working independently (for ex. Customs & border checks do sampling checks, testing of food additives and medicines happens after they're introduced to the market with the premise they're not on an existing harmful compounds list, etc).
Yeah, and the FDA approved Thalidomide, and continues to allow us to be doused in glyophosate, when even the Europeans have said no. Government is sloppy at best.
There is also a fallacy that I call "argument from the brochure." (https://christophercook.substack.com/p/new-logical-fallacy-argument-from-brochure) We've all done it. It's when we describe government as perfectly achieving all of the things it clams it achieves in its own brochure, when in reality, it does not.
"We will protect against aggression." (10s of millions of war dead, 150 million dead at the hands of leftists, and a few tens of millions more at the hands of non-leftist governments. Close to 400 billion all told, adding together Rummel's numbers with war dead—all in a single century.)
"We will protect against crime." (hundreds of thousands of rapes, murders, assaults and property crimes every year.)
"Only we can build the roads." (Our roads are crap and 40,000 die on the every year.)
I could go on. Obviously we anarchists have some burden of proof, but we cannot go up against a description of government that stylizes and whitewashes what it actually is and does. (Not saying you are doing this; I am just making the point.)
Though it is obviously just a snapshot, just reading Chapter 12 here is pretty helpful: https://ia801508.us.archive.org/14/items/911-material/Pdfs/Democracy%20The%20God%20That%20Failed.pdf
It's in the deep end of the pool, of course, but it has a lot of good info.
I just realized I messed up positioning my reply to your comment. Sorry!
Great food for thought.
On the subject of consent, I suggest exploring the topic of "informed consent", not just in relation to medications.
Informed consent is about evaluating risks, including worst case, and trying to ascertain the risk profile of the subject undergoing the intervention.
Taking a step back, it's frustrating how the superficiality of our narratives combined with the conflicts of interest (corruption) of the agents involved in games (for ex. Elections) with short-term payoffs leaves us with an ever more fragile system.
Given we don't have a culture with an elevated "council of learned elders" able to choose or influence outcomes wisely in the interests of all, our dystopian reality can't but lead to ever greater catastrophic results (LA fires or current UK freedom of speech laws), which will invariably lead to calls for an authoritarian figure to "fix things" if a singular event is catastrophic enough, and since history rhymes, we know what this will lead to.
Besides learning to dodge the bullet, I don't see realistic solutions. On a macro level all our western countries are bogged down with their respective bureaucracies and constellation of institutions and social webs of relations and conflicts of interest paid for big money. Taken together, it's, change adverse (people who rock the boat exit the stage mostly). If anything, without always referring to conspiracies, this helps explain how it's practically impossible to roll back bad decisions and if anything conspiracy theories helps us digest the ugly truth of us being part of the same mundane and banal system we're critical of.
On the subject of consent, in https://christophercook.substack.com/p/protocols-natural-law, I proposed that consent must be voluntary, informed, explicit, transparent, and revokable. I suppose we could remember that with RIVET (the first letter of each). What do you think—does that cover all that must be covered re: consent?
As to the rest, I see what you are saying. I hate to bang my drum, but it further reinforces, for me, why market anarchism is the way to go. All of these attempts to create large systems, and impose them on large groups in large areas, seem to fail. Let people choose their own course. Let the market offer desirable solutions, and let people choose between them.
Otherwise, when the large system goes bad (and they always do), the bad is forced in everyone. And no one gets to escape it because our societies all have the same belief that large-scale solutions being forcibly imposed on everyone is the only possible way to go.
Right on Christopher! Democracy is Demonic!
🤝
The Declaration of Independence provides what appear to be the only two possible justifications for government, one explicit and the other implicit. Both are included in this passage: “...to secure these rights [to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness], Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed...” In this context, “justification” means the act of showing something (e.g., government) to be just.
The explicit justification given above is consent. If everyone to be governed had given their explicit informed consent to be governed, the government would be justified (subject to certain common law requirements). But most of us have never explicitly given our informed consent to be governed. Nor have we even been shown the courtesy of being asked for our consent, which could easily have been done by sending us a contract every year asking whether we agree to pay certain amounts in return for certain services. I suspect most of us would not agree to pay outrageous prices for most of what the government does.
The implicit justification for government given above is securing rights, which amounts to maintaining justice since an injustice is a violation of a perfect right. A perfect right, as distinguished from an imperfect right, is a right of justice, which is the only type of right that may be justly enforced. Examples include the rights to life, liberty, and property. The maintaining of justice does not require consent. For example, if someone tries to murder you, you need not obtain the aggressor's consent to use force against him to prevent an injustice, If the government were to uphold justice better than any alternative arrangement, the government would for that reason be justified. Unfortunately, most of what the government does is unjust. That is, the government creates more injustice than it prevents—even more than private criminals create. The evidence of which I'm aware indicates that private alternatives that face competition and depend on voluntary payments for services would probably do a better job for much less expense. Consequently, I find myself attracted to anarcho-capitalism.
Same here, John!
Since perfection is impossible here on Earth, all we can do is do our best. And I would say that in this regard, “our best” is described as finding the sweet spot at which enjoyment of natural rights is maximized and disruptions thereto are minimized.
The Founders, and the natural lawyers of the century before them, contended that that sweet spot was to be found with some sort of “limited” government. I used to buy that argument. I do not anymore.
First, and most importantly, because I do not believe it is necessary to violate rights in order to “secure” them. And second because no such “limited” government, even if it were justified and necessary (it isn’t), can be kept limited.
So ancap it is!
My favourite movie franchise is The Purge. Has one heard of the concept Year Zero? 🤔
When totalitarians try to engineer it artificially (like Pol Pot and the Khmer commies did), it always goes hideously wrong.
If it happens organically, then it happens.
Do you remember Tyler Durden describing his vision near the end of “Fight Club”?
right! 💯
Keep spreading the word. Time to wake up from our long slumber!
As You know... I have gotten it quite well and long ago! Thank You for Your brilliant work!
Not sure why You're stepping back from the web... I would too, but that I need the web to share awareness that We do not need to live in poverty with moneyed psychopaths in control - but We need enough of Us standing sovereign, and We need free energy tech out in the open.
Thus I share everywhere I can. My latest:
Even Taxes Are Not Certain (article): https://amaterasusolar.substack.com/p/even-taxes-are-not-certain
Thank you for the compliment.
I am not sure what you mean about stepping back from the web. Oh, you mean reducing my social media footprint? Yeah, that just means leaving LinkedIn, Pinterest, Gab, Twitter, and Facebook. LinkedIn is garbage and fedposters. Pinterest just feeds me pictures of pretty girls and conversion vans (both of which are nice, but not really essential to my daily fight for freedom). Gab is meh, plus lots of anti-Jewish stuff. Twitter has become an engagement farm, and despite Musk's fancy words, there is still a ton of censorship there. And Facebook—don't even get me started on Facebook.
I too like spreading awareness, but my ability to do so on those platforms was throttled years ago to the point of irrelevance. So for those reasons, I'm out.
Ah, fair enough. Those specific outlets indeed suck! I rather like MeWe... I am not shadow banned like I am on X-Twatter (and Bluesky - which took 7 days to shadow ban Me! LOL! SomeOne does not want My work spread...), I don't see anyOne arguing there about "It's the Jews," like, as You say, Gab is replete with, and I never signed up for Pinterest or farcebook.
Linkedin I signed up for right when it first started, but never visit.
Yeah, so far I have had no issues on MeWe. Been on there for... 3, 4 years? A fair while with no indication of shadow banning.
You actually bothered with Bluesky? LOL. I am surprised it took them even 7 days. Most lefties—their rhetoric to the contrary notwithstanding—don't want actual freedom.
How is MeWe? Do you get actual engagement there?
I heard little about BS, and as I am looking for places to offer My work, I thought I would give it a shot. Now I have a place to drop My links in case someOne looks Me up there. Haha!
Yeah, MeWe is not the worst. I do get lots of interaction on My comments, and an occasional interaction on My posts. With a fair few holding My view.
And... An occasional "It's the Jews" and a lot of People agree when I say, "No it isn't. They're just the scapegoats."
Yeah, the “It’s the Joooooos” thing is happening a lot more here too now, and it is getting really tiresome.
I give high probability there are People paid (or bots let loose) to push that narrative. It just does not seem organic to Me.
I have never watched squid games, the movie. I don't want to either. Ever since that giant squid thing in the movie "Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea" they have kind of terrified me. The word itself is kind of squidish or is that squeamish. They seem like the strangest creatures to me. Kind of like leftists.
Leftists or giant squids…leftists or giant squids…tough call.
(NB: There are no actual squids in "Squid Games.")
As a veteran when I hear "squid" I immediately think of the Navy.
Not a TV watcher, turned it off in 2013. Only watch video clips and old films on the internet.
Most of it is garbage. But there are some good things out there.
Korean TV has not (yet) been subsumed by the Leftist Mind Virus. It's still mostly pretty wholesome.
I'd have to brush up on my Korean. After "yoboseyo" I'm lost.
Most of what I know in Korean would get my face slapped. A couple of phrases told to me by a hair and makeup gal on a set, which I asked as I was quasi-flirting with her, and one thing that a couple of Korean dudes working at my local convenience store told me to say, followed by "But don't say that to anyone." I still don't quite know what it means.
(Also, most K-dramas are dubbed.)