Navel-gazing by Kyle A. Lohmeier
Considering one’s self to be an Anarcho-Capitalist philosophically on planet Earth in 2016 CE can be a bit bleak at times. Just about every square mile of practically habitable land is already dominated by a government; worse yet, most governments on Earth are socialist, dictatorships or both. Here in the USA, we can at least discuss anarchist philosophy publicly without being sent to a gulag, but that alone doesn’t get us much closer to the stateless society I dream of.
Among other self-styled AnCaps I interact with, there’s little consensus about what to do given the aforementioned state of affairs. Many see the mere act of voting, of participating in a government process, as a violation of AnCap principles. Many liken trying to fix government “from the inside” to joining the KKK and trying to reform it to be more inclusive and tolerant “from the inside.” Beyond that, I’ve found a dearth of ideas as to what to do to actually bring about the ruler-less society we know humanity most needs.
Indeed, it appears we don’t have many options. Theoretically, we could wait for the inevitable end of civilization in this country, whether that comes from economic collapse, a zombie apocalypse, thermonuclear war or whatever else; and then carve an Ancapistan out of the ruins and live peacefully in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. I love the Fallout videogame franchise as much as the next guy, but that’s not quite the stateless society I’ve dreamed of. Plus, I’m 40 and I don’t see the so-called “shit hitting the fan” any time real soon. A violent revolution that deposes the government just isn’t practical or likely, either.
So, as people philosophically opposed to the mere existence of the state yet forced by circumstance to live under one anyway, and among people who believe the state is necessary – some of whom actually adore and worship it – what do we do?
Well, the best I can come up with is what I like to think of as a “stoic anarchism;” (that term probably already exists and means something else, but whatever) accepting the reality of our circumstances and doing our best to overcome and improve them. That, for now, involves actually working within, and as part of, the machinations of the state. In short, philosophical AnCaps need to hold their nose and run for, and win elected office. Not just because doing so will put AnCaps in positions to start paring back government, but because just getting there will require waking a lot of people up along the way.
We need politicians who not just sound different from the rest but approach the idea of government and governing from a fundamentally different perspective than all other politicians. With very few exceptions, every politician in the United States today views government as something that can be made to benefit people individually and mankind generally. This idea is taught as fact to American schoolchildren, who grow up to believe it, often unquestioningly. Imagine then, if politicians kept popping up, running in local, state and federal races whom approached and talked about government from a completely different, and correct perspective: that it is violence incarnate and its resources are all stolen property?
Imagine a politician standing before a crowd and instead of promising them that government will fulfill all their dreams, instead pointed out that, in fact, government is what’s between them and all their dreams? If he or she said: “If you look critically at most of your problems, and certainly all of your financial ones, you’ll find that the government itself is responsible for them, or at least makes them much worse,” what might the reaction be? What if charismatic and intelligent people ran for office nationwide and kept pointing facts like these out? We just might make a little progress; just maybe.
Realistically, there is an awful lot of low-hanging fruit AnCaps could pluck when it comes to exposing the wastefulness and evil of government. Currently, it looks like the federal government is doing all it can to make that argument for us when it comes to marijuana. While a growing majority of Americans believes, correctly, that marijuana should be decriminalized, the federal government’s bureaucracies are moving faster and faster to head off legalization efforts as they work to protect their cronies in Big Pharma. This issue alone could be a foot-in-the-door to getting average Americans to realize government is their problem first and foremost. There will be popular pushback against the FDA’s tightening of restrictions on marijuana. If Trump’s appointees start clamping down at the federal level on states like Washington and Colorado and others that have legalized it for recreational use, there will be massive demonstrations. When those occur, it would be good if black-and-yellow AnCap flags were flying high among the protesters as it will be a literally golden opportunity to expose people to our philosophy. How more receptive an audience to the notion that government is violence can one imagine than a large group protesting against marijuana laws?
Another glaring evil of government that can easily be pointed out is the ongoing warfare of the last 15 years and its failure to do anything but require more warfare to address the problems earlier battles gave rise to. I honestly believe a majority of Americans are war-weary, and goodness knows all anarchists are; wouldn’t now be a good time to expose more people to the Non-Aggression Principle, and the rest of Anarcho-Capitalist philosophy by explaining that war is the ultimate province of the state?
In fact, now in general is as good a time as can be imagined to try to “work within the system.” The country is changing demographically as I type this, while both major political parties are undergoing upheaval. The Republican Party is stuck with a President-Elect it didn’t really want and there are deep fissures within the party’s ranks as to what it should stand for. The old-guard religious right clings to power while the demographic groups supporting it dwindle; they’re hurtling toward irrelevance and don’t even know it.
The Democratic Party is also in deep turmoil, though most of them appear to still be ignorant of that fact. Trump’s election wasn’t so much a victory for him as it was a rejection of Obama and his third term as embodied by Hillary as well as a spurning of the “social justice” movement she embraced. The career politicians that compose both parties have long been out-of-touch with their constituents and the nation in general and now can barely relate to the people they seek to represent.
Based on these factors, I believe now is the time for us to find and field candidates and to run them as either Republicans or Democrats; probably Republicans. The 2016 election proved, among other things, that the duopoly isn’t going away. Libertarian Party Candidate Gary Johnson got more coverage and attention than any other LP candidate in history and still fared terribly in the polls after being denied a podium on the debate stage. The game is rigged so that only the two major parties can ever win. So, let’s change those parties, or at least one of them, from within.
Imagine if after two years of Trump a bunch of candidates ran in the midterms for state-level congressional seats, or even some national ones, running on messages like: “Who’s ready for peace?” Or, “Who’s ready to stop locking people up in cages for marijuana?” On those two issues alone, philosophical AnCaps could certainly score some wins. And, again, along the way and in doing so, those candidates would expose people to the philosophy.
Imagine then, a bit later, if those philosophical AnCaps actually managed to get marijuana legalized in their state? Or, if by some miracle, got it removed from all federal laws and regulation? Then, when the world didn’t end and, instead, everything got better as all the abuses and waste involved in enforcing anti-marijuana laws ceased, we could point to how getting government out of the way actually made something markedly better. From there, we’d have a strong case to make that reducing government interference would improve other things as well. Maybe, just maybe, before long, we could pare this monstrous thing back to something akin to minarchy.
Yes, as a philosophical AnCap, I’m opposed to minarchy; obviously, if government is the problem it doesn’t make much sense to give it only the most important jobs. And, leaving it alive at all will only give government a chance to eventually grow beyond the parameters initially set for it, I know. And, no matter how small, government is violence and is therefore always wrong. I know.
However, I should think all American AnCaps would agree that a state of minarchy would be exponentially better than the oppressive corporatist oligarchy we have now. In fact, I would think we’d all appreciate any movement toward smaller government, as such, by definition, would be a step toward anarchy. Plus, reducing the size, power and cost of government even a little bit benefits everyone tangibly. To get to the perfect, stateless, AnCap society we know humanity needs to evolve and thrive will be a very long journey, to say the least. It’s time to take some actual, physical first steps.
Debating AnCap ideas on Facebook groups and threatening to throw Bernouts out of helicopters is fun and all, I get it; but when I go outside afterward, I’m still not living in Ancapistan. Clever memes, however dank, and spamming liberal groups with “Taxation is theft,” isn’t going to get us there. At some point, the more presentable among us needs to go out in front of the people and eloquently convince them of the rightness of our philosophy in the political square. Not me, I’m short, fat and bald and given to swearing a lot, but someone else, preferably taller and with great hair.
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