Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Scared of Freedom: another gold nugget from Larken Rose

Personally, I struggle to explain to others why I ignore and shun the political process whenever and however I am able to do it, as a matter of survival.  Oh, I try, but I always sound obtuse, even to myself.

Larken Rose seems to have no such trouble, and I am always happy to amplify his thoughts by whatever meager amount I can.  Via Wendy McElroy, check out "Scared of Freedom", which begins thus:

There are a lot of people who consider themselves freedom advocates, who, with righteous zeal and indignation, vehemently rail against the injustice, corruption and oppression "government" continually spews forth. However, many of those same people, when they hear someone suggesting life without the monstrosity called "government," will immediately go into turbo-backpedal mode, insisting that some "government" is needed, that we need to work to fix the system, and that we need a good "government," that just does good stuff, and protects us, and so on.

The situation is a lot like a battered spouse, who is given the opportunity to escape her abuser, but who insists that she can't leave, that he really loves her, that she needs him, that the relationship can be fixed. Such a response shows that, as much as the abuser is a nasty scumbag, there is also a serious problem in the mind of his victim, which enables the abuse to continue.

So it is with statists who just want a nicer, gentler "government." They don't actually want freedom. In fact, they are scared to death of freedom, which is why they refuse to give up the very beast that they are constantly condemning and complaining about. They insist that "government" is needed to protect people, to maintain liberty and justice, and do nothing more. The fact that the gang called "government" has never done that, anywhere in the world, at any time in history, doesn't shake "limited statists" from their faith in the idea that that "needs" to happen.

There's a lot that follows this, and it's made of the same stuff.  RTWT, and please consider sharing it with those who need it.

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