Subject: Opening the Cage (Part 3 of 3) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 (Note: Regarding my last message, don't confuse rights with abilities. Even when completely justified, having a shootout with the cops is almost always hazardous to one's health. My prior message wasn't a suggestion; it was a statement about moral justification. As long as most people insist on believing that the collective owns them--via "government"--it will be really dangerous to be one of the crazies who thinks he owns himself. The other sheep don't take kindly to those who resist being fleeced.) Dear Subscriber, Almost everyone is a part-time collectivist. Most people have a few things which THEY want imposed on everyone else via "authority," but when something they don't like is imposed upon THEM, they get all self-righteous and indignant about it. Well, to paraphrase (and slightly mangle) the "golden rule," if you don't want other people doing it to you, DON'T DO IT TO THEM! If I go around randomly killing people, others have the right to stop me by force, not because they own me, but because they own THEMSELVES, which logically implies the right of self-preservation. But if I'm not stomping on someone else's self-ownership, NO ONE has the right to use force to control me. If I want to smoke pot (I don't), have a rifle (I do), wear women's underwear (I don't), eat cheeseburgers (I sometimes do), marry an aardvark (I don't), say nasty things about politicians (I do), or hit myself in the head with a baseball bat (I've felt like it on occasion, but haven't yet), no one has the right to forcibly stop me. And calling the control "law" makes exactly NO difference to whether the control is justified. If the "government" doesn't OWN me, it has exactly ZERO right to do a thing to me, unless it's defending someone ELSE'S self-ownership (in which case, anyone would have the right to stop me). "Of liberty I would say that, in the whole plenitude of its extent, it is unobstructed action according to our will. But rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law,' because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual." [Thomas Jefferson] Sadly, people rarely think from principles, so they play both sides of the fence. Your average "liberal" will holler about his rights to smoke pot if he wants to, and then turn around and advocate the robbery of almost everyone in the country, in order to fund things HE likes (art, welfare, whatever). Meanwhile, the average "conservative" insists that he has a right to own firearms and drink his beer, but wants the "law" to forcibly stop someone else from doing LSD. "Boo hoo! My rights are being infringed!" Well, if you're advocating that anyone ELSE'S rights be infringed, serves you right! If you think it's just fine for the "legal" thugs to kick down doors, drag people away, and put them in cages, because they had a LEAF the politicians don't approve of, then when those same thugs rob and control YOU, don't whine about it. Or, to quote a far more eloquent expression of the same sentiment: "No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck." [Frederick Douglass] Sadly, things are discussed in terms of legislation so often these days that most people have a hard time differentiating between "That's a bad idea" and "That should be illegal." There are LOTS of choices people make that are stupid or dangerous (physically or otherwise)--everything from eating too much junk food, to snorting coke, to skateboarding, to sitting in front of a computer too much (that's me), to sleeping around, to watching too much TV, to drinking too much beer--the list goes on and on. Acknowledging that you have no right to use VIOLENCE to stop those things is worlds away from saying you CONDONE such choices. But if you want to be allowed the responsibility to make your own choices, and you don't want to be a complete hypocrite (and a fascist), you have to also allow other people to make choices you think are stupid. My advice: Treat everyone as if he owns himself. Because he does. Don't advocate that he be forced, "legally" or otherwise, to do ANYTHING, except for refraining from infringing on someone else's self-ownership. And if you do advocate using non-defense force, don't pretend to believe in freedom; and when you then find such unjustified force aimed at YOU, you damn well deserve it. Sincerely, Larken Rose www.larkenrose.com -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Note: This signature can be verified at https://www.hushtools.com/verify Version: Hush 2.5 wpwEAQECAAYFAkbRw70ACgkQGmVFo/iGj33vnwP8CXojv13niQk9bD4lPE5W1fEuSh6Y ckA7FDY4Ue2Ijlw5qy/EbwGmA55VY8bPWc1MMn7DoBMR4ONzfiyq69/vu2ZovMQalfIz j88ZnlvKcJ+0NrTt2NBVxXmF9M139fHqNjEzpkEGpPTC9GG4d9kIx+rZ7uGYL8Jeu2s9 iuGpisQ= =pcyZ -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- Click for free home mortgage rates from top companies. http://tagline.hushmail.com/fc/Ioyw6h4d9W6niJgvenHBbvnN9rx19VOP7voxG07GZXTOPgDmyu9KuY/ --------------------------------------------------------------------- To subscribe, send a blank message to tmds-on@mail-list.com To contact the list owner, send your message to tmds-list-owner@mail-list.com