The True Political Spectrum

In America, we're taught that there is a political that has the democrats on one side and the republicans on the other.  Democrats are said to be on the left, and republicans on the right.  Democrats may be referred to as left-wingers, and republicans as right-wingers.  People who try to mix both beliefs are called centrists (meaning in the center).

In reality, there is not much different between these two "sides."  When you boil down all their beliefs to the bone, they both revolve around the idea that some person or group of people have the right and authority to rule over you and to claim ownership of your life and property.  We call this belief authoritarianism.

The opposite of this belief in authoritarianism is voluntaryism.  It is the belief that all people own themselves and that no other person can have a higher or better claim on the ownership of their body or property than the individual can.  It is the belief that all the ways people interact should be voluntary.  Neither force, nor coercion, nor threats should be used to make someone do what they don't want to, or to stop them from doing what they want to do, as long as they are not harming anyone else or violating another person's rights.

All governments are authoritarian.  But some are more authoritarian than others.  North Korea is one of the most authoritarian governments.  They control much of their citizens lives, such as the books that can be read, the movies they can watch, the news they are told, where they can work.

The American Constitutional government is a less authoritarian government.  The Constitution was written to clearly define what government was allowed to do and to put limits on how much the government could interfere in the lives of it's citizens.  Unfortunately, the government has claimed more and more power for itself over the years and is becoming more authoritarian every year.  America does not have the limited government that the writers of the Constitution intended, and the actual government is much closer to the oppressively authoritarian government of North Korea than most Americans would like to admit.

America claims to be the "land of the free," but it is more accurate to say that it is the "land of the people who are more free than some people in the world and less free than others."  The only truly free society is one follows the principles of voluntaryism.

Democracy is freedom's enemy

Americans believe that democracy is equivalent to freedom. Or they at least believe they are able to be free because they live in a democratic country. They believe that their ability to participate by voting in making decisions about their community protects their freedom.

But in truth, living in a democratic society is exactly the opposite of freedom. Democracy allows other people to have a say in whom we may marry, where we may live, with whom we may trade, what products we may purchase or sell, with whom we may be at peace with and whom we must be at war with, how much of our income we may keep for our own needs and pleasures, what kind of business we may operate, and what we learn in school. Democracy allow our neighbors, people across town, even people a thousand miles away who we have never met and shall never meet, people we have little in common with and may even be religiously, politically, morally, and socially opposed to, to have a say in how we live our lives and how we are allowed to pursue happiness.

In a free society, we would be free to make all our own decisions, as long as our actions didn't cause harm to others or their property.

The Government's Most Important Lie

A man named Friedrich Nietzsche said, “Everything the State says is a lie, and everything it has it has stolen.” While it is a truth that everything the government has it has stolen, it is a bit of an exaggeration to say that "everything" it says is a lie.  But it does lie an awful lot, and one lie stands above all the rest.  When the government tell the lie that "we the people are the government," it convinces people that they need the government and that the government has our best interest at heart.

Is it right for a large group of people to use government to rule a smaller group of people?

This is a pretty simple diagram that shows us a pretty important idea. I'd just like to re-state what each of the boxes says to be sure you understand the idea of the diagram.

The first box has an idea that will seem naturally logical to us, that if John told you that you had to obey him or he would violate you, that would be wrong. By violate, the author means to steal from, kidnap, cage, or murder you. So to put it in other words, it would be wrong for John to make you pay a fine, lock you in handcuffs, put you in jail, or kill you if you didn't obey him. None of your friends, family, or neighbors have the right to do any of this to you.

The second box has another idea that will naturally seem logical to us. Nothing changes about what was said in the first box, even if John can get 2 or 3 or even 10 friends to join him in trying to make you obey him. As a group, they still don't have the right to violate your rights to force you to obey them.

These first two boxes make sense to most people. But the ideas in the third box seem un-natural to most people. Government schools teach you that when people get together and have a vote, that somehow(they never explain how) the winners of the vote get to use the power of the government to force the losers of the vote to obey the winners. The winners of the vote are given control of the police, jails, and courts to force anyone who doesn't agree to follow their rules to pay fines, go to court, be locked in a cage in jail, or even be shot and killed by the police.

What I hope you have been learning from my podcasts and blogging and our discussions is that John cannot give any power to the government that he doesn't have himself. So if there is any action it would be wrong for John to do, the same action is wrong for the government to do. Let me finish with an example: It would be wrong for John to force you to pay him for a piece of paper that allows you to get married. Since that action is wrong for John, it is also wrong for the government to require us to buy a license from them before getting married.

American Democracy is Not a Fair System

What your teachers don't want you to know about democracy.

Republicans vs. Democrats vs. You

The two biggest political parties in America are the Republicans and Democrats. They pretend to be opposites of each other, like black and white, or night and day. But that's mainly just an act. For example, republicans are known to be in favor of a big military and war, and the democrats are known to be anti-war. But president Obama is a democrat and has started several new wars since becoming president. Democrats are known to spend lots of government money and the republicans are known to be against government spending, but president Bush was a republican who spent billions of dollars on war and the military. They talk like they are opposite of each other, but in all the areas that really matter, they are just the same. What this cartoon tries to illustrate for you is the fact that although people(represented by the sheep) get very enthusiastic about voting for "their side," the two sides are really the same. No matter if the sheep elect a lion or a wolf, they are going to be in trouble. Either way, they have to be worried about being eaten for dinner. It's the same for us. No matter if a republican or democrat are elected, we have to worry about how much of our money they are going to steal and how many of our freedoms they are going to make illegal.

Democracy is nothing more than mob rule.

Voting

Problems with Democracies