You own yourself. If you don’t own yourself, you own nothing at all. This is your life to explore and create. Anyone who takes your choices away for your own life is eating away at the one life you have.
Libertarianism is more than a political ideology. It is a moral reality. A spiritual conviction acknowledging a respect for myself and extending that same respect towards others.
I know of four good arguments for self-ownership. One I can briefly give is by Rothbard in his book Ethics.
Here are the possibilities:
- A person owns himself entirely
- A person does not own himself entirely
- If a person does not own himself entirely, then a group partially or wholly owns another group
- This is false, because it violates the universal ethic. There must be some differentiating factor that gives greater claim of some people over others. In the absence of this burden of evidence, each person owns himself entirely.
- Alternatively, everyone partially or wholly owns the other
- This is not functionally possible for two reasons. One, everyone cannot surveil, analyze, and interpret what everyone else is doing. They are not technologically or cognitively capable. Second, everyone is not capable of thinking in concert and coming to a consensus. If there is no consensus, there is no decision, no maintenance of life, and no survival.
- If a person does not own himself entirely, then a group partially or wholly owns another group
- A person being owned by others is either morally unsubstantiated or functionally impossible. Therefore each person wholly owns himself.
A person’s right to their own life is extended to their property. Property is that part of unclaimed nature that a person put their time, energy, and ingenuity into to develop, or that they later decided to exchange with someone else.
From this we derive the basis of libertarianism, the Non-Aggression Principle.
The Non-Aggression Principle states that no one may initiate force, or the threat of force, against another person or their property.
I define “force” as the use of the person or property against the will of the rightful owner.
The initiation of force, or aggression can take the form of murder, assault, theft, fraud, etc.
It is no surprise that the organization that has amassed the greatest ability to use force—the government—is also the greatest aggressor. In the last century alone, governments have killed nearly 200 million through genocides. Humanity has suffered through wars that would otherwise be known as mass murders, maimings, tortures, kidnappings, and terrorism. Endless laws creating a mine field out of building your life. Threats warping countless aspects of everything you know. Taxes, inflation, confiscations. The millions of people rotting away in jails, whether convicted or merely suspected, most with no victim. Prime years of meeting people and building up families are lost. Their careers are set back, and they are left in a permanent underclass due to their record. The people that they love live with a gap in their lives. Videos surface of callous police brutality of so many forms, showing how bad things have become underneath the surface.
The government is a machine of soul-destroying violence.
The goal is not the elimination of government. It is the elimination of aggression, whether called government, or by any other name. This is a monumental but necessary challenge.
We are left with the question of how.
As we seek a moral resolution, we also must seek a moral method to reach it.
Aggression starts with human nature. That must either be changed, which is the work of God, or it must be restrained, which is the work of politics, or rather the distribution of power.
If power is balanced in such a way that aggression is either impossible or unprofitable, aggression can be stopped. This work of balancing power isn’t required by the non-aggression principle, but is in the interest of affecting it.
What are ways that the capacity to aggress can build?
- Force
- In this case, the estimated profit of direct attack is greater than the estimated risk.
- This tends to be focused on places where resources aggregate, such where traffic is funneled into central points.
- Examples:
- Currency is ½ of most transactions. By controlling currency, the government can steal a greater percentage of the pie by printing more.
- ISPs and backbone to internet, where data gets funneled into central points, makes it convenient to tap into and mass collect internet traffic. This allows for surveillance, and the control of data flow, where most of us live our lives and do business.
- Traffic and transportation enforcement often ends up being a means to discover other crimes, and confiscate money through civil asset forfeiture.
- The Silk Road was a website that allowed people to buy and sell anonymously. They could visit the site without their locations being tracked by using Tor, and they could make purchases anonymously with a properly set up Bitcoin wallet. The website offered an escrow service, so that when a purchase was made, the purchaser could ensure they would receive the product and not lose their money. Because the identities could not be tracked, the website was physically beyond the ability of the government to regulate and control. It was trade without aggression, protected mathematically with encryption. A truly free market, something unusual in human history. And not just free but fortified from aggression. The weakness was the central point. The owner of the website, The Dread Pirate Roberts, or Ross Ulbricht as we came to know him, was depended upon to run the escrow service. Large amounts of Bitcoin were in his possession at various times, and his identity was concealed. He could have disappeared with the money, as other later copycats have done. It was Ross’ convictions and principles that held that experiment together. Regardless, because it depended on one person. Once Ross was discovered by the government, the experiment was ended. While victimless crimes were committed on the website, Ross was given more than two life sentences for running an e-commerce website.
- Seige.
- Another way to control a person is by gaining control of those people and resources on which they depend. A third party does not have the same interests as the target, and is likely to act in a self-interested way. Getting the third party to betray the target generally takes less pressure against them than it does against the target.
To add effectiveness, this pressure can be applied in secret. The target may or may not know they are being betrayed, or the real reason for the betrayal. This helps ensure that the third party will not face backlash.Alternatively, or in addition to this, a moral pretence can be provided, a face-saving excuse, to the third party for why they are doing this. - Examples:
- Operation Chokepoint. Instituted under the Obama administration. The DOJ used the FDIC to investigate banks to pressure them to cut off banking services to firearms dealers among other legal services. They used informal and unwritten suggestions to these banks.
- Through the secret Prism program, internet companies handed over customer data to the government.
- Employers assisting the government in collecting your taxes.
- Another way to control a person is by gaining control of those people and resources on which they depend. A third party does not have the same interests as the target, and is likely to act in a self-interested way. Getting the third party to betray the target generally takes less pressure against them than it does against the target.
- Threat
- A threat is easy to levy compared to defending against it. If an aggressor has the ability to harm only one person, but threatens ten, each person individually faces a credible threat of serious harm. This may allow the aggressor to coerce all ten individuals into surrendering less than the value of the thing threatened. This means the capacity to harm one person can be multiplied by using threat rather than a direct attack.
The aggressor can be enriched and empowered as the victims pay up. In the next iteration, he may have developed the ability to harm all ten, and now can credibly threaten a larger number.
The aggressor can further multiply his force by compelling those threatened to threaten others themselves. A slave army.
This dynamic is a type of prisoner’s dilemma. The prisoner’s dilemma is a famous example of a game theory problem. In the prisoner’s dilemma, the police have captured two suspects. They isolate the suspects so that they can only communicate with the police. The police inform them that they can accuse the other of the crime or not.
If they both accuse each other, they will get a small penalty.
If one accuses the other, but the other is silent, the accused will get a steep penalty, but the accuser will go free.
If both refuse to cooperate with the police to accuse and remain silent instead, they can both go free.
Because the prisoners are unable to communicate with each other and make a deal that is in both their best interests—to not cooperate with the police and not accuse, they are left to assume that the other will act in his own best interest and accuse them, and so the best thing for them to do is to accuse back.
In the case of the aggregate threat, if all ten had refused to empower the aggressor, his ability to do any real harm would be minimized, if not otherwise eliminated. However, because they were relating to the aggressor as isolated individuals, and not also to each other, acting in their own best interest, they cooperated and built up the aggressor. The result is an exponential growth in aggressive potential. - Examples:
- Taxes. Taxes are acquired through the threat of force. The ability to use that force to enforce total compliance does not exist. However, because each isolated individual considers the possible harm of jail to be worse than paying, they pay. The result is a system that is further enabled to threaten and extract finances. *Note: I am not recommending refusing to pay taxes. Matthew 17:25-27
- Coerced informants. If police have or claim to have evidence of a crime that can put a person in jail, they can make a deal with that person to reduce or eliminate their penalty if they will find evidence to put one or more people in jail. This process may continue with the new people they have leverage over. The police may continue to amass leverage on groups of people who will go out to collect more foot soldiers.
- Taxes. Taxes are acquired through the threat of force. The ability to use that force to enforce total compliance does not exist. However, because each isolated individual considers the possible harm of jail to be worse than paying, they pay. The result is a system that is further enabled to threaten and extract finances. *Note: I am not recommending refusing to pay taxes. Matthew 17:25-27
- A threat is easy to levy compared to defending against it. If an aggressor has the ability to harm only one person, but threatens ten, each person individually faces a credible threat of serious harm. This may allow the aggressor to coerce all ten individuals into surrendering less than the value of the thing threatened. This means the capacity to harm one person can be multiplied by using threat rather than a direct attack.
***
Samuel Edward Konkin 111, a student of Rothbard, believed that the morally consistent strategy to create a free world was to act in the market as opposed to the state, to engage purely in voluntary exchange, and not coercive exchange, and to educate the masses to do likewise. This meant to conduct business without regard to, and in defiance of, laws and regulation, as long as you do not violate the non-aggression principle. He believed that as independent security services were developed, and this mode of business flourished, eventually the market would be capable of defending itself from the state, and would become clear and distinct from it. It is to break bad laws until you can be sure you can get away with it.
I diverge from Konkin in several major ways.
One, I do not believe it is right or necessary to break the law to create a free world. I do not believe it is right because as a Christian the edict to “obey every ordinance” is clear enough.
Also, this is arguably poor strategy. This effectively is handing over massive leverage over your life and freedom to the government. Konkin’s assumption is that the payoff is worth the risk. However, government informants trick and pressure people to break the law for a reason.
It is as Ayn Rand said.
“There’s no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals.”
Second, I do not hold that any political action is a violation of libertarian principles. A violation of the non-aggression principle is. But it is possible to take political action in such a way that you do not violate it.
I find inspiration from Konkin’s work in the growth and protection of the Agora. The market. The free portion of humanity. The just portion. That part of us that serves and betters the other, while having the dignity of possessing our own lives. Every voluntary exchange is by its nature constructive towards this end.
However, not all entrepreneurial activity is equally as effective at resisting aggressive assaults. Some techniques and technologies are harder for the state to sink its teeth into.
For example, gun ownership is enshrined in law as a right. But that is just words on paper, asking the government to restrain itself.
As Lysander Spooner said,
“But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain – that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it.”
It is when a sufficient percentage of the population exercises the right to own a firearm that it becomes self-enforcing. It is more than the government’s good conscience holding them back from taking people’s guns. The people have real power in their possession.
In the same way, other perfectly legal and safe technologies and techniques can be used to further protect the right to self-ownership and exchange.
As discussed before, we saw how aggression can aggregate in different ways. In order to counter these threats, a series of methods can be used to protect the individual from invasion.
- Where the government might seek to physically attack, we can arm and decentralize.
- Where the government would seek to control us through those we depend on, we can become independent and trade on a peer to peer and decentralized basis.
- Where the government would seek to isolate and threaten, we can build means of communicating out of their reach to make agreements with each other that are in all of our best interests.
If a critical mass of people adopted enough fortifying technologies to cover the three critical areas of sustaining their own lives, defending their own lives, and trading with each other without interference, then the system of aggression is already defeated. This can start now.
I am not demanding everyone follow all of these methods. Not everyone likes guns, or wants to have one. That does not threaten our liberty as long as enough people do.
I am also not decrying specialization and an imbalance of wealth. We all benefit tremendously from these things. As long as sufficient means to physically sustain and protect ourselves and trade without interference exists, is available to those who want it, and is put into practice by a large enough percentage of the population, the foundation of individual rights has been secured. The diverse successes acquired on that foundation should not threaten it.
To bring this fortified independence to the masses, a tremendous amount of expertise must be broken down and simplified to be easily assimilated. It is easy enough to say you should grow your own food. For some who have tried, it takes weeks of research and work, many costly mistakes, and the result of a $200 carrot.
They say it takes 10,000 hours to achieve mastery in a given topic. It isn’t reasonable to ask people to put their lives and livelihoods on hold to invest those hours for each of the various fields it would take to become truly independent. That is why, in each category, using the best of our modern knowledge and technology, we need to devise the easiest and least expensive way to get the average person from a to z.
***
When I was 18, my dad showed us some Alex Jones documentaries. My father had a security clearance, so I wasn’t sure if this was informed by something he couldn’t talk about. I listened for a long time as many of the world’s most powerful and influential people talked about the need to drastically reduce the population. That was a depressing thought. I later learned about some of the vulnerabilities society had, such as an EMP attack or solar flare, cyber-attack, inflation, food shortage, or fuel shortage. Interestingly, these vulnerabilities are largely based on those centralized systems we depend on.
I was looking for what to do, how to prepare and stock up. As much as I wanted to do something, just knowing where to begin and end was an enormous task. Most people only had so much interest and energy to devote to that, so very little got accomplished.
The survivalists talk about the Golden Horde, which refers to the majority of people caught unprepared in a catastrophe now desperate for resources. What would the average person be willing to do to get the food I could set aside? It was a dark reality to think about. To survive, you would likely have to kill people only trying to feed their children. Maybe people you know. Maybe friends and relatives. The best hope a survivalist could have is to hide very well with their stash and wait out the masses of desperate people fighting and starving, and whatever other calamities they would endure. As I imagined myself there hiding, I thought I wished there was something I could have done to help all those people. What systemic changes could have been made so they were not all caught so desperately unprepared?
That is when I realized creating and popularizing the means for people to survive was not only the way to prepare for the best possible scenario—freedom, but also to prevent the worst. Simple methods of growing food could easily be learned and spread in times of crisis. Gun ownership would discourage mass violence. Decentralized communications like mesh networks and inflation proof currencies would be hard to take down, enabling the creative energies of those in crisis to be organized in a market to meet critical demands.
***
If individuals have the right to their own lives, property, relationships, and exchange, then the ideal society will structure power in such a way that each person can:
1. Sustain themselves and their property
2. Defend themselves and their property
3. Conduct voluntary relationships and trade with others
Innovation that favors independence can decentralize society’s power structure and bolster individual rights.
To make this available for mass adoption, a suite of products, projects, and processes can allow the layman to acquire the bare essentials for a sustainable life with as little time, effort, and resources as possible.
Because this covers a cross section of disciplines and will need to accommodate a broad range of people, these innovations should seek, as much as possible, to be:
• Easy to learn
• Easy to build
• Made of accessible materials
• Affordable
• Easy to use
• Customizable
• Mobile
Methods of Sustaining Life
• Off Grid Home
- Build with the earth
- Compressed earth brick—fireproof, sound proof, bullet proof, breathable, mold proof, non-toxic, regulates humidity, regulates temperature, operationally low cost, low maintenance, structurally sound, earthquake resistant, hurricane and tornado resistant, 1000 year durability, recyclable, available locally and worldwide. Con—not mobile and they take up space. Groups such as Earth Block International consult, sell, and teach. Elon Musk is considering making them with the byproduct of tunnel digging. Human Ecology created a way to build a less expensive brick compressor, making producing them more affordable.
- Super adobe—cheap and simple. This uses packed mud in layers of bags, and can be plastered over. Calearth.org developed this method.
- Building underground—very inexpensive. Mike Oehler wrote the book The Fifty Dollar and Up Underground House Book based on his own house.
- Opensourceecology.org—“OSE is currently developing a set of open source blueprints for the Global Village Construction Set (GVCS) – a set of the 50 most important machines that it takes for modern life to exist – everything from a tractor, to an oven, to a circuit maker… The current practical implementation of the GVCS is a life size LEGO set of powerful, self-replicating production tools for distributed production. The Set includes fabrication and automated machines that make other machines. Through the GVCS, OSE intends to build not individual machines – but machine construction systems that can be used to build any machine whatsoever. Because new machines can be built from existing machines, the GVCS is intended to be a kernel for building infrastructures of modern civilization.” I saw a Ted talk with founder Marcin Jakubowski, Ph.D. He said he considered economic power to be a type of political power, and by creating economically independent cities of maybe 1,000 people, he was creating a way people could have greater diversity in political options, and people could vote with their feet and find a political system that most closely aligns with their own.
- Open Source Ecology is developing the Seed Eco Home, a modular eco-home to solve the affordable housing issue anywhere in the world where light frame construction is applicable. It is a 1000 SF house that you can build with a friend in one week for $50k US.
- Tiny homes – A tiny home is a home less than 400 square feet. They can be on a foundation or trailer. They are usually built out of materials comparable to other homes, so are of better quality and more durable than RVs. Cost can be from a few thousand to over a hundred thousand.
Other benefits to tiny houses:
- Time and money saved means more time with family and friends, pursuing dreams and causes.
- Is a good starter home
- Safety net in case of income reduction
- Passive income as a rental unit
- Could allow more free-staters to move to NH
- Can help solve homelessness
- Help domestic violence victims escape to safety
- Can give you a better social life as you can more easily choose who you want to live around.
- Offers better security as it is independent from others and offers less access, so landlords or roommates cannot give permission for authorities to enter, but can be visible to others so break-ins are discouraged.
- Being able to move easily gives you greater flexibility to take up job opportunities or travel.
- You don’t have to leave your pets behind in a tough rental market
- Integrating passive design concepts and using other off grid techniques like rain catchment, composting toilets, wood stoves, and solar power offers a plug and play way for people to be independent.
• Food
- Wild edibles–app that allows people to easily locate plants, identify, know how to harvest and cook, such as Wild Edibles by Winter Root LLC and Wildman Steeve Brill
- Sprouts—This is very easy, cheap, and nutritious. The seeds can be stored long-term. ¼ cup of lentils usually produces 3 cups of greens in a few days. I created a DIY sprouter out of Tupperware that is very easy to build. The tutorial is on my blog at saclark411.wordpress.com.
- Microgreens—the next stage of growth.
- Hydroponics –can be grown indoors or outdoors, year round, no soil required so plants are immune to soil-borne diseases, no pesticides required, it grows more in a smaller space, conserves up to 90% of the water, can be simple or complex, commercial kits or DIY, inexpensive or expensive to set up, inexpensive to maintain, no weeding required, plants grow 20% more quickly and 25% larger.
Ideally, I could buy a grower that sits in front of a window in my kitchen, and I can open a cabinet door like I would open a fridge and take what food I want. Logistics could be calculated by an open source app. - Permaculture – This is growing food the way plants grow in a forest, so they complement each other. Ideally this could be set up and require little to no maintenance.
- An edible landscaping company could plant the forest.
- backtoedenfilm.com shows how covering the soil with wood chips reduces a lot of the hard work associated with gardening by retaining water, reducing weeding, preventing erosion, and fertilizing the soil. Tree services often give away free wood chips.
- Fishing and animal husbandry.
- Aquaponics is mixing a fish farm and a garden, using the waste from the fish as the food for the plants, and the plants purify the water for the food. I have found this system to be complicated for the beginner. A simple and low cost kit could be developed.
- Chickens are one of the easier animals to keep and are very productive.
- Food preservation – the LDS preparedness manual is a free and useful survivalist tool and has lots of information on preserving food storage.
• Transportation
- Bike—low cost, more easily maintained, boosts your health, not dependent on fuel or electricity, and can’t be hacked like cars can. A group collecting donated bikes can offer free or cheap bike parts, bikes, and teach members how to do repairs. bikecollectives.org has instruction on how to set up one of these organizations and a map of where existing ones are.
• Education
- Homeschooling, unschooling, tutors, schools, apprenticeships, and do-it-yourself curriculums affords a wide array of options that are not beholden to government interests. A marketplace with such programs continue to make education higher quality and more affordable.
Methods of Defence
This starts with Taking care of your own security
The ability to be mobile is a big asset.
Don’t make yourself a desirable target. Conceal valuables. Blend in.
Select good neighbors, and be on good terms with them.
Create redundancies.
Barriers:
- Separate living quarters denies general permission to entry
- Strong building materials to protect against brute force or bullets; sand bags or features around the base of the building
- Protect against imaging technologies, radar, thermal – More research needs to be done
- Terrain difficult to cross, such as mud, thick brush, uneven terrain.
- Fencing such as electric fencing for bears
- Hedges such as thorn bushes
- Bars or grills on windows
- Block access to crawl spaces
- Heavy shutters, 3/4″ plywood with hanger bolts
- Home security – ACME Locksmith – Youtube
- Internal hinges
- Hinge guards
- Security bar or bolt
- Secure strike with long screws into frame studs, or longer strikes with more screw holes
- Metal wrapping around the deadbolt protects the wood from pressure.
- Grade 3 hardware is the weakest. 2 or 1 are stronger
- To defend against “lock bump,” a metal anti-bump lock, or smart key that resists bumping, or specialty keys.
- Anti-drill plates
- Get a random lock, conceal the make and model. Thieves can research the specific method used to pick a lock based on the make and model.
- Install locks correctly
- The plunger should not go into striker
- Have a deep enough hole for the latch
- No slot in the door frame to open the latch
- For sliding door: lock pin
- Security film to prevent window breaking; inside and outside
Early Alerts:
- Where would a bad actor come from? Would he use a long distance attack? What kind and from where? What would he hide behind? How would he approach? Would he prefer paths that are covered, concealed, where he can move quickly and quietly? Remove blind spots where bad actors can attack or approach in hiding. Use terrain and structures to channel approaching people into a place visible from the house.
- Graven paths and leaves allow you to hear people approach
- The neighborhood can be designed so neighbors can keep an eye on each other’s property. The neighborhood demographics can be mixed, so retired people or families stay at home while others leave to work, and there are always people to watch.
- Have a peep hole or other means to view around the house
- Have good lighting
- Motion, radar, heat, pressure, or sound sensors that activate light, sound, or sprinklers
- Trip wires or bear bells
- Bell on the door
- Surveillance. Raspberry pi or old android phone options?
- Live streaming in cases of danger where there is a risk that evidence recorded locally may be confiscated.
- Dog Disorient invaders
- Automated triggers with strobe or bright lights, sounds, smells, and smoke
- Traps to capture or injure invaders may be problematic, as it is difficult to distinguish between an invader and a drunk or cop, and may be illegal.
- Guns, pepper spray, and the like. Open source plan allow you to 3D print guns in the event of confiscation.
- Encryption
Community Security
• Security culture, awareness
- Have clear terms with the community and honor them.
- Raise awareness of the sort of problems that may occur and how to respond, such as assaults, break-ins, scams, stalking, or police informants.
- Respect privacy. Cover your phone camera. Every time you pull it out and point it at someone, you may be exposing them. This makes it very easy for undercover surveillance to operate.
- Don’t ask or tell about violations of victimless crimes.
- Do not discuss passwords and amount and locations of valuables.
- Avoid gossip. Gossip is a problem because it is does damage to a person’s relationships or potential relationships based on allegations that are not presented to them directly for them to defend themselves against. Attempt to address personal problems constructively.
- Vet individuals who you give greater degrees of confidence to, and move people out of your inner circle of trust as they violate that confidence. Allow for confession, restitution, and reconciliation.
• Custom emergency alert. This is simply a pre-recorded message that can be sent out to a pre-determined group of people at the push of a button. It is useful in case of emergencies. Cell 411 is an app that does this. This method should be as secure and decentralized as possible. You can select the people you want to come in case of medical emergency, conflict resolution, crisis intervention, home invasion, break in, or fire. These people can know you and your family, pets, and house. They can advise you on ways to mitigate risks, and drill ahead of time as needed.
• Blockchain redacted evidence storage. The blockchain makes it nearly impossible to destroy the evidence. Unredacted evidence should be kept confidential, so if it is published to a blockchain, it should be in encrypted form. Storing large amounts of information on a blockchain may be a logistical problem. Blockchains like arweave may work. Often, these are a little too technical for the average person, so good user interfaces should be developed.
• Private security: preventative in nature. Detroit Threat Management is one example. Pete Eyre was talking about doing something like this.
• Legal insurance: such as Legal Shield.
• Private investigation insurance
• Private arbitration insurance. Currently, private options for lawyers, investigators, and arbiters are very expensive. Using the insurance structure can disperse the cost and allow more people to be covered.
• Collection agency
Security against the state
• Know your rights. The Free Thought Project and Copblock have developed cards to show police officers to assert your rights without speaking.
• Checkpoint alerts
• Cop watch – This should be a regular service to document an interaction with a police officer for legal purposes. This could be a business.
- Apps that fight traffic tickets like offtherecord
Using the state to enact the NAP
• Jury Nullification—Allows the jury to give a not guilty verdict in cases where they believe the accused is guilty, but they believe the law is unjust. During prohibition, jurors often let alcohol smugglers go because they did not agree with prohibition. Juries have refused to convict those helping fleeing slaves in violation of the Fugitive Slave Act. New Hampshire passed a law that reads “In all criminal proceedings the court shall permit the defense to inform the jury of its right to judge the facts and the application of the law in relation to the facts in controversy.” By raising awareness about jury nullification and the injustice of convicting people of victimless crimes, the public can dampen the state’s ability to lock peaceful people away.
• Sanctuary cities and states. Nullification. Hundreds of local governments have refused to assist the federal government in enforcing immigration laws. The 10th amendment states that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.“ In the areas where the federal government is operating beyond the authority the constitution affords it, the states can choose to not provide their resources or manpower in enforcing those laws and operations. This is called nullification. There is a long record of success with this. The Tenth Amendment Center website explains nullification as “Any act or set of acts which has as its result a particular law being rendered legally null and void, or unenforceable in practice. Madison gave us a blueprint on how to do this in Federalist #46. He suggested four steps to take on counteract and stop federal programs – whether “warrantable” or “unwarrantable,” the most significant being a “refusal to cooperate with officers of the Union.” The federal government involves itself in almost every aspect of life, but depends on state assistance to do almost everything. If states refuse to help, it becomes nearly impossible for the feds to enforce their laws or implement their programs. We can use this strategy to undermine and nullify all kinds of federal acts in practice – from warrantless spying, to gun control, to plant prohibition and more.“
• Vote in a Sheriff who respects the Non-Aggression Principle
o Many Sheriffs have recently refused to enforce laws, whether federal or state, that required detainment of illegal immigrants, gun confiscation, and lockdown orders. Sheriff Mack established the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, in which Sheriffs assert that they will keep their oaths to the constitution. The sheriff is the highest law enforcement authority in the county. Were libertarians to elect a sheriff who committed to not violate the non-aggression principle, it would effectively stop all local government aggression. Mack and others argue that the sheriff has the authority over federal law enforcement operating in his county. This would mean the sheriff could require that federal agents notify him of any law enforcement activity they plan to do, and receive permission to do so. It may mean that the sheriff has the authority to arrest federal agents who are acting outside of their constitutional authority. If that is the case, that would effectively insulate the free staters from the periodic federal raids that we are still subjected to. As fantastic as the Free State Project is, it doesn’t protect us from direct federal aggression. A consistent and effective application of an NAP sheriff could counter government and private aggression within a county in an election cycle.
Young Americans for Liberty is doing effective work scouting and training liberty candidates and following their progress as they work in the legislature. That sort of support could be applied to sheriff candidates.
• Moving to increase the concentration of freedom-lovers in a given area. The idea of the free state project is to move like-minded liberty lovers and activists to one state to increase our voting power and create liberty in our lifetime. Over 5,000 people are already here, and almost 20,000 have pledged to move. This also sets us up to better consider moving to a separate political entity such as sea steading or space colonization, and in the event of a societal collapse it would be ideal to be around people who know that society ought to be set up to respect property rights.
Methods of Trade
In order to build a free society, there needs to be a way for people to associate with who they choose and disassociate from who they choose. They need to be able to communicate, make contracts, and exchanges, without external tampering. These are the ingredients of the free market, and can be programmed to be mathematically impossible to break.
• Precious metals and crypto currency—When the government controls the currency, they can print more and thus possess a greater percentage of money, giving themselves a greater percentage of buying power. It is an invisible form of theft, and results in people finding themselves more impoverished and the government enriched to conduct endless wars and build up its control. By using a different currency, you exempt yourself from the hidden tax of inflation. Gold and silver are time tested options. Crypto currencies with a public ledger are inflation proof, and have the advantage of being a secure and near instant way to do global commerce. Not all crypto currencies are equal. The best qualities are still being tested and developed. While they are based on code the government cannot eliminate and encryption they cannot break, there is still a danger of attempts at regulation and taxation. The government is actively attacking the freedom to use crypto currencies through means such as the raid against the crypto six last March. Ideally, crypto currencies would be legally protected as first amendment speech, and would be designed to be as difficult to regulate as possible.
• Open source hardware. As it stands, hardware can be built with back doors. Think Penguin is a company that is working on solutions.
o Hardware may be protected against Intentional Electro-Magnetic Interference, or IEMI weapons, with faraday cages.
• Open source software is preferable to proprietary software which requires that you trust the programmer, who can then be targeted and pressured. Open source code is a good way to ensure that the code can be thoroughly vetted.
• Encryption is a way to prevent data from being read without a password.
• Tails is an operating system that can run off of a CD or USB. It runs in RAM so the data is not recorded on the computer, and it uses Tor by default and has other privacy features.
• End to end encrypted communications so no service provider or website carrying the communication can snoop.
• Tor is a way to channel data through the internet to help browse the web anonymously.
• Mesh networks—Currently our internet data goes through centralized points before arriving at its destination. This allows easy access for the government to surveil, block, and tamper. Think about the extent to which the modern person depends on the phone and internet. The government essentially has the physical ability to control that. They can do a lot without the target even realizing it is being done. It would be difficult for a free society to exist as long as the government has the ability to control or cut off a substantial portion of our ability to communicate and organize.
Mesh networks structures the internet such that there are a series of nodes spread out across a geographic area. In order to connect to someone else, your data could travel through many different paths, jumping from node to node, to get to its destination. The network would be resilient as damage to parts would not take down the whole. It would be efficient as data could travel along the most efficient path. And it would be resistant to government control. In order to conduct mass surveillance, the government would have to control a critical mass of nodes. It would be challenging for them. This would liberate a large part of society, and put the power of the internet back into the hands of the users.
Thomas Freedman is working on hardware that can support a mesh network, called a pirate box. Althea.net is developing the software, and can automatically pay people for the use of their nodes with crypto currency.
• Blockchains are a way to publish and automatically disburse information. It eliminates the need to trust that the holder of the information is maintaining it securely and accurately. This innovation prevents censorship and control of the data, which can aid social media and publishing platforms. It can protect the integrity of e-commerce and banking. Contracts connected to digital wallets can be programmed, such as on Ethereum, so no enforcement is needed.
What is the next step?
• Use your own skills to develop products and DIY projects
• Develop free, simple, quality, open source training and share it with others
• Create community spaces where people can share tools and knowledge. Freedomcells.org is a website where people can form groups of eight to work on being more independent. Makerspaces and hackerspace can spread, test, and synthesize that knowledge into something more efficient.
Those with expertise can set up groups or workshops. They can volunteer their time, or sell it. Those who want to learn can volunteer their time, pay, or get hired on. Those with spare resources can offer them in exchange for knowledge, work, or money.
For example, a person with knowledge of simple gardening methods could start a garden and create workshops. If they need labor, they can train volunteers, charge students to work the garden, or hire workers. If they need land, a land owner, perhaps even a homeowner with a lawn who would like a garden established, could offer their land in exchange for the knowledge, the establishment of a garden, the produce, or money.
If someone has knowledge of bitcoin, encryption, mesh networks, etc, they can give consulting services for free or for a cost. They can set up workshops so groups of people can get set up. Hacker spaces could regularly meet for those with more or less experience to improve their security and privacy techniques.
Those with knowledge of building could set up workshops to build tiny homes. People who want to learn to build could volunteer, or be charged, or hired on. The home could be sold or rented, or the homeowner could cover the cost.
Those with tools could create a maker space, and charge people for access.
Groups can be set up connect those with resources, knowledge, and those who want to learn across the different topics. Better, more streamlined methods of getting people independent and able to connect securely could be tested and discovered. These can be distributed to the larger community as simplified open source training. A method of collaborative design can be established, like github for programmers or opensourceecology.org, that allows people all over the world to publish their idea, contribute, and branch off.
The end result should be a repository of products and methods that offers the least expensive and easiest way for the majority of people to be able to sustain their own lives, defend themselves, and trade free of interference.
***
We, and our children, are being strangled by villains who pretend to be saints. As long as the power exists to control us, governments can threaten, attack, and destroy, and demand we thank them for it.
We don’t have to surrender, and we must not. We and those after us should live peaceful lives of unbound ingenuity and aspiration. The pieces lie around us to build our defences.
The Dread Pirate Roberts wrote this on the forums before his arrest:
“Hey gang,
I read more than I post in the forum, and my posts are rarely of a personal nature. For some reason the mood struck me just now to put the revolution down for a minute and just express a few things. There is a curtain of anonymity and secrecy that covers everything that goes on behind the scenes here. It is often fast paced and stressful behind this curtain and I rarely lift my head long enough to take in just how amazing all of this is. But when I do I am filled with inspiration and hope for the future. Here’s a little story about what inspires me:
For years I was frustrated and defeated by what seemed to be insurmountable barriers between the world today and the world I wanted. I searched long and hard for the truth about what is right and wrong and good for humanity. I argued with, learned from, and read the works of brilliant people in search of the truth. It’s a **** hard thing to do too with all of the misinformation and distractions in the sea of opinion we live in. But eventually I found something I could agree with whole heartedly. Something that made sense, was simple, elegant and consistent in all cases. I’m talking about the Austrian Economic theory, voluntaryism, anarcho-capitalism, agorism etc. espoused by the likes of Mises and Rothbard before their deaths, and Salerno and Rockwell today.
From their works, I understood the mechanics of liberty, and the effects of tyranny. But such vision was a curse. Everywhere I looked I saw the State, and the horrible withering effects it had on the human spirit. It was horribly depressing. Like waking from a restless dream to find yourself in a cage with no way out. But I also saw free spirits trying to break free of their chains, doing everything they could to serve their fellow man and provide for themselves and their loved ones. I saw the magical and powerful wealth creating effect of the market, the way it fostered cooperation, civility and tolerance. How it made trading partners out of strangers or even enemies. How it coordinates the actions of every person on the planet in ways too complex for any one mind to fathom to produce an overflowing abundance of wealth, where nothing is wasted and where power and responsibility are directed to those most deserving and able. I saw a better way, but knew of no way to get there.
I read everything I could to deepen my understanding of economics and liberty, but it was all intellectual, there was no call to action except to tell the people around me what I had learned and hopefully get them to see the light. That was until I read “Alongside night” and the works of Samuel Edward Konkin III. At last the missing puzzle piece! All of the sudden it was so clear: every action you take outside the scope of government control strengthens the market and weakens the state. I saw how the state lives parasitically off the productive people of the world, and how quickly it would crumble if it didn’t have it’s tax revenues. No soldiers if you can’t pay them. No drug war without billions of dollars being siphoned off the very people you are oppressing.
For the first time I saw the drug cartels and the dealers, and every person in the whole **** supply chain in a different light. Some, especially the cartels, are basically a defacto violent power hungry state, and surely would love nothing more than to take control of a national government, but you average joe pot dealer, who wouldn’t hurt a fly, that guy became my hero. By making his living outside the purview of the state, he was depriving it of his precious life force, the product of his efforts. He was free. People like him, little by little, weakened the state and strengthened the market.
It wasn’t long, maybe a year or two after this realization that the pieces started coming together for the Silk Road, and what a ride it has been. No longer do I feel ANY frustration. In fact I am at peace in the knowledge that every day I have more I can do to breath life into a truly revolutionary and free market than I have hours in the day. I walk tall, proud and free, knowing that the actions I take eat away at the infrastructure that keeps oppression alive.
We are like a little seed in a big jungle that has just broken the surface of the forest floor. It’s a big scary jungle with lots of dangerous creatures, each honed by evolution to survive in the hostile environment known as human society. All manner of corporation, government agency, small family businesses, anything that can gain a foothold and survive. But the environment is rapidly changing and the jungle has never seen a species quite like the Silk Road. You can see it, but you can’t touch it. It is elusive, yet powerful, and we are evolving at a rapid clip, experimenting, trying to find sturdy ground we can put roots down in.
Will we and others like us someday grow to be tall hardwoods? Will we reshape the landscape of society as we know it? What if one day we had enough power to maintain a physical presence on the globe, where we shunned the parasites and upheld the rule of law, where the right to privacy and property was unquestioned and enshrined in the very structure of society? Where police are our servants and protectors beholden to their customers, the people. Where pace our leaders earn their power and responsibility in the harsh and unforgiving furnace of the free market and not from behind a gun, where the opportunities to create and enjoy wealth are as boundless as one’s imagination.
Some day, we could be a shining beacon of hope for the oppressed people of the world just as so many oppressed and violated souls have found refuge here already. Will it happen overnight? No. Will it happen in a lifetime? I don’t know. Is it worth fighting for until my last breath. Of course. Once you’ve seen what’s possible, how can you do otherwise? How can you plug yourself into the tax eating, life sucking, violent, sadistic, war mongering, oppressive machine ever again? How can you kneel when you’ve felt the power of your own legs? Felt them stretch and flex as you learn to walk and think as a free person? I would rather live my life in rags now than in golden chains. And now we can have both! Now it is profitable to throw off one’s chains, with amazing crypto technology reducing the risk of doing so dramatically. How many niches have yet to be filled in the world of anonymous online markets? The opportunity to prosper and take part in a revolution of epic proportions is at our fingertips!
I have no one to share my thoughts with in physical space. Security does not permit it, so thanks for listening. I hope my words can be an inspiration just as I am given so much by everyone here.”
Dread Pirate Roberts
S. A. Clark 