Analysis by Kyle A. Lohmeier
It’s 1991. I’m 14 years old and eagerly awaiting the release of Metallica’s new album, the self-titled, so-called “black” album. I can barely wait, my thumbnail digs at the seam of the cellophane wrapper for what feels like an hour. Finally, I get it unpeeled. The cassette case opens with a slight creak. That wonderfully nostalgic scent of old cassette tape booklets that the kids today will never know about wafts out, the ink seemingly still wet on the lyric card, the back of which bears high-contrast photos of the band members. I pop the cassette into my JVC twin-deck player and crank up the volume. I’d already heard “Enter Sandman,” but as soon as that track fades out, I brace for what’s next. Sadly, what was next was about an hour of mostly disappointment with a few bright spots on the B-side. Worse yet, as months passed, I started noticing the damned jocks and preps were listening to it. Metallica had become accessible, hip; even popular. My little kingdom of metal-dom was now invaded by people who didn’t belong there. Thank hell for Slayer.
It’s 2016. I’m 40 years old and, by now, fairly sure of who and what I am. I’m a libertarian. I don’t believe for a moment anyone or any institution has the right to initiate violence against anyone for any reason. I know that all humans own their own bodies and I accept, nay embrace all of what that core tenet entails, all of the consequences that naturally flow from it. We’re a small group, libertarians. Given that our most notable feature is an independent streak a mile wide, it’s not terribly surprising we have a hard time organizing effectively. We do, however, have the wonderful problem of always being correct on every issue, because, at the end of the day, we always err on the side of individual liberty. It’s a good feeling.
Or, it was.
Now, as I drive around listening to The Answer I keep hearing Larry Elder talking about holding things in his “baby-brown, libertarian fingers.” The man is “pro-life.”
The Libertarian Party just selected as its nominee former Republican Governor of New Mexico, Gary Johnson, again. Johnson said in a debate that private business owners shouldn’t be allowed to discriminate against serving gay couples. His vice-president, former Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld once supported draconian gun laws, but has since reversed himself, claiming that governors sometimes have to make tough choices, and given a chance, he’d have made different ones back then.
As I understand the philosophy, or understood it, the notion that the government can and should use violence to take away a woman’s rights for nine months because she caught preggo is exactly contrary to the core tenets of libertarianism. Likewise for the government using violence to compel a private business owner to serve a customer that business owner doesn’t want to serve for whatever reason. Ditto for telling adults how big of a box with a spring in it they can own. All of a sudden I’m 14 again and sneering as I hear “Sad But True” coming from a jock’s Camaro as he drives by – nine years later he’d be jamming to Kid Rock’s “American Badass” thinking it’s a totally different song – there are intruders in my realm.
The fact that I now feel somewhat adrift and searching for a new noun to encapsulate my philosophy is really just a mere personal annoyance. However, the ramifications of this broadening of the definition of libertarianism spells absolute doom for the Libertarian Party as a worthwhile entity in the USA and will only serve to further sully the word “libertarian” among those on the Left who already consider it nothing more than republicanism given a new name. And, if the Libertarian Party adopts a pro-life plank in its platform, distinguishing it from the GOP will become near impossible for those on the Left as well as many on the Right. Indeed, it is the Libertarian Party’s adherence to individual liberty on both fiscal and social issues that sets it apart from the Republican and Democrat parties. Or, it was.
Party wonks often talk about the need for a “big tent.” And that would be fine if we were talking about a party with a name like “The Republican Party,” “The Democrat Party,” “The Green Party,” or “The People’s Front of Judea.” But, when your party’s name is borrowed from a philosophy’s name, it seems to me the tent can only be big enough to contain those who actually subscribe to said titular philosophy. Instead, the designation “libertarian” is turning into a disaster relief shelter for Republicans who want to distance themselves from Donald Trump. Indeed, “libertarianism” is experiencing its own migrant crisis. Sadly, it’s too late to intercept the rubber dinghies coming across the strait toward us; too many of them already made the beach overnight. We’re overrun.
So, I still know who and what I am, I’m just not sure what the nomenclature for it is anymore. There’s no point in trying to re-rescue “liberal” from the Left, even by adding “classical-“ or “Jeffersonian-“ prefixes to it. The word has been irreparably damaged since Ludwig von Mises’ published his brilliant book. While I agree with much of Objectivism, obviously, that term is too closely associated with Ayn Rand and the legions of mouth-breathers who’ve been reflexively conditioned to despise her by public education; so, that’s out.
Is “Individualist” taken? “Individualism,” perhaps? “Leave-me-the-hell-aloneism?” “Piss-off-I’m-not-harming-anyoneism?” “No-that’s-actually-my-money-and-I-don’t-want-to-help-you-shoot-missiles-at-brown-people-half-a-world-awayism?” Far too cumbersome, most of those.
It was a lot easier when I was a teenager and could just pop in “Seasons in the Abyss,” knowing it was inaccessible to jocks, preppies and other poseurs.
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