So one morning your daughter comes to you and says that she is engaged to Bobby, a boy she has been dating. “That’s great,” you say, giving her a hug, “but you have to marry Dave instead.” She wriggles out of your embrace. “Excuse me?” “You can’t marry Bobby, pumpkin. You have to marry Dave.” […]
It is the worst day of your young life. Your doctor has just told you that you have terminal cancer. You have a few months to live, maybe six. Your skin crawls, your mouth is bone-dry. Lists of everything you have to do scroll by endlessly in your mind’s eye… Finances, my will, a long […]
After twenty years as a ‘small government’ libertarian, I have spent the last 18 months or so strenuously – and unsuccessfully – resisting the implacable logic of ‘market anarchy’. I started out thinking it was a rather odd theory, but I have come to appreciate some of its finer points, and thought it might be […]
Has this ever happened to you? You’re discussing liberty with someone, and you say something like: “The government shouldn’t take care of the poor.” The response you get is: “Oh yeah? Well then who would take care of the poor?” Ah, you reply, there will be more charities and job opportunities and everyone cares about […]
I am always astounded when someone rejects even the possibility of a stateless society by demanding that I supply proof such a society has ever existed, or could ever work. “But I can give you an example of a perfectly functioning non-violent society right this minute!” I reply. “Oh yeah?” my interrogator will demand skeptically. […]
Let us imagine that tomorrow morning, when you flip on CNN, you see Wolf Blitzer being jostled by surging crowds. Everyone is running, staring at the sky in fear. “Space aliens have landed in Luxemburg!” cries Wolf, wide-eyed and almost hysterical, “and they have a message for all mankind!” There is a burst of static, […]
Containing Danger without Enslaving CitizensBy Stefan Molyneux, MAHost, Freedomain Radio - www.freedomainradio.com One of the great challenges of anarchistic philosophy is the challenge of prisons, or the physical restraint of violent criminals. I have dealt with this topic once before, but I am still receiving numerous requests for clarifications on how a stateless society might […]
By Stefan Molyneux, MAHost, Freedomain Radio – www.freedomainradio.com A free society is by its very nature based on negative rights – i.e., thou shalt not rather than thou shalt. One common opposition to these negative rights is the ‘saving strangers’ scenario often advanced by statists. In this moral parable, an onlooker sees a man who […]
Problems and Solutions By Stefan Molyneux, MA Host, Freedomain Radio – www.freedomainradio.com The current controversy over immigration obscures – as most current controversies do – the depth and scale of the moral problem that is ‘immigration control’. Even the word ‘immigration’ is specious, since what is merely being described is ‘moving’. Moving from New York […]
A commonly-heard response to criticisms of existing state policies – or, heaven forbid, the existence of the state itself! – is the demand that the person criticizing either drop his objection, or leave the country. (A third option is sometimes given, which is the option of working to reform the existing state system, however, the […]
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