Government (statism) *IS* Violence. It's not just "a few bad apples."
The main reasons for individuals rejecting the ideas of Voluntaryism and Anarchism are lack of understanding, and fear. People have been brainwashed to think of the state as an order-giving, protective parent. To question this parent's legitimacy creates an existential crisis people are afraid to face. They also tend to believe that anarchism (read: Voluntaryism/Anarcho-Capitalism) are attempts to destroy civilization, reationality, law, and order. This couldn't be further from the truth. The opposite is true.
Please enjoy this brief talk on the subject.
~KafkA
Graham Smith is a Voluntaryist activist, creator, and peaceful parent residing in Niigata City, Japan. Graham runs the "Voluntary Japan" online initiative with a presence here on Steem, as well as Facebook and Twitter. (Hit me up so I can stop talking about myself in the third person!)
Nice video
What would you say to the argument that the monopolization of violence by the state is a response to an imperfect world which best approximates a path of minimal violence?
Also the coercive appropriation of assets can help redistribute wealth to the needy in a way that ultimately leads to benefits which outweigh the benefit of one's freedom from forced appropriation?
That is counter to the reality of the state which has criminalized all kinds of things that fall under victimless crimes (an oxymoron) first of all. The other appalling thing is that through state intervention there are a slew of crimes committed abroad against humanity and against actors that have neither the capability or the motives to inflict violence onto government. The pat of minimal violence therefore is a blatant lie in the face of reality, and a straw man because it not argued why and how monopolized violence is better than private and voluntary services that can act as security.
To coerce and threaten others for altruistic ends is another oxymoron. People are altruistic inherently as is evident by our long history without government and societies that have formed outside the rhetoric of forcing people to be altruistic. Ultimately leads to benefits, I guess we just aren't there yet, we need to be taxed more and coerced and forced even more, maybe then we will see the benefits of that.
Thank you for your kind words and your reply.
This is my view, and I hope it will not be taken as a personal affront, because it is not.
I would say that the state's approach objectively does not best approximate a path of minimal violence, as said approach does not address the metaphysical realities of individual self-ownership and scarcity. The state's apparatus is mob rule, which always denigrates and destroys the smallest minority, the individual, when push comes to shove.
Assuming that people would not help each other absent state welfare is a common statist rebuttal which, to me, says more about the person making said rebuttal than the nature of the problem itself. Are we really so callous as to believe that none of us wish to help his or her neighbor? If so, what good is government going to do?
262,000,000 corpses (not counting fatalities from war) in 100 years. I'd say the data's in. Government (statism) is a failed experiment in human societal organization. Indeed, it was never designed for that. It was designed to kill, murder, rape, pillage, control. defraud, exploit, and pilfer.
The state is fit for nothing save the fiery pits of a putrid and disgusting hell, which hopefully shall be banished from the minds of sane men forever. Not as forgetfulness, but an an evolution past.
This video is great. Super inspiring. Thank you! Your deep understanding of human psychodynamics is rad!
Thank you very much. So happy to hear that!