by Frederick Mann (2010)
Open Yourself Up to New (and Better) Possibilities
By exploring new dimensions of liberty and freedom, you can expand the options, possibilities, and potential of your life. You can open up a new world of freedom, liberty, health, wealth, and happiness for yourself. Unleash your imagination, and the options, possibilities, and potential really become endless.
"I don't remember how I found this site but I can tell you that it has changed my way of thinking about personal freedom. And I am now trying to 'live free in an unfree world.' Over the past six months I have studied the writings and recommended books that are a part of Build Freedom. I have marked your home page as my opening page on my browser and have forwarded articles from this site and from the discussion group associated with it, to spread the word to friends and relatives. If you are interested in finding what real freedoms entail, differing possibly from what you have been taught, this site will enable you to take off the blindfold of ignorance. Thank you Fredrick Mann for sharing this enlightenment with all who will take the time to look into its depth." -- Michael, 4/12/99 (Click here for more testimonials.)
Important videos providing some context for the rest of this article (click the links to watch them)
World Freedom Challenge (WFC) is a challenge to freedom activists all over the world to consider the activities, ideas, and suggestions presented here. I invite you to examine this series of concepts, principles, and activities. It may become possible for your personal freedom to grow faster than is currently the case for most individuals.
Any individual who values his or her personal freedom can start at the beginning of this series of concepts, principles, and activities, and progress toward greater personal freedom.
If enough individuals expand their personal freedom... some really good things could happen in the world! Hopefully, that will become evident as you look over these pages.
It's quite possible that my approach to freedom might be, in some respects, incomplete and even mistaken. You're welcome to tell me what you think I should improve.
I would like to introduce you to Schaeffer Cox and his "Solution" to the "Freedom Challenge".
[Update: Schaeffer Cox has since been falsely accused of "conspiring to murder government officials", among other bogus accusations, such as "violence against his wife". Additional details can be found at: https://freeschaeffer.com/, https://usobserver.com/schaeffer-cox-set-up/, and https://personalliberty.com/the-federal-framing-of-schaeffer-cox/ -- "26 years in prison for speaking up against corruption! ... Schaeffer Cox is a political prisoner who is being held in a secret, black site prison, called a CMU. He has NEVER committed a crime in his life." -- Freedom activists in general, and we at Build Freedom, reject the initiation of violence against anyone, including "government officials".]
The Solution: Schaeffer Cox Speaks on the Future of the Liberty Movement
"... You're never where you want to be, until you want to be where you are." - Schaeffer Cox
In the above video, Schaeffer Cox also said: "Sun Tzu's Art of War, 13th rule: 'get your enemy to do useless things' - they're using that one on us alright, and we need to recognize it." - a paraphrase from Sun Tzu's 31 Best Pieces Of Leadership Advice:
"13. Engage people with what they expect; it is what they are able to discern and confirms their projections. It settles them into predictable patterns of response, occupying their minds while you wait for the extraordinary moment - that which they cannot anticipate."
In broad terms, the "Cox strategy" can be described as "creating alternatives to replace the corrupt state when it collapses". Specifically, Cox has put in place a "liberty bell system", common law courts, and organized a militia.
Is the "Cox strategy" a complete solution or a partial solution? Will other freedom leaders and organizers implement the "Cox strategy" in more parts of the world? Will the "Cox strategy" take root and grow?
Cox raises the issue: "Who is the enemy?" Should the people constituting the "corrupt state" be regarded as the enemy?
What about people in corporations who own and finance many politicians and bureaucrats?
What about taxpayers who finance the "corrupt state?"
I discovered Schaeffer Cox on the Voluntary Society website, which includes three main sections: "Conditioning", "Concept", and "Action". Cox also talks about people being "conditioned".
Is the enemy the people who make the "corrupt state" possible by "conditioning" people?
Is the "conditioning" itself the enemy?
Is the "corrupt state" allowed to exist because most people are uninformed, misinformed, gullible, obedient, and relatively helpless? Who or what is the most basic enemy?
I also came across HansHoppe.com, The Property And Freedom Society, and Hoppe's article The Property And Freedom Society -- Reflections After Five Years, in which he writes about "unmask[ing] the State and showcase it for what it really is: an institution run by gangs of murderers, plunderers and thieves, surrounded by willing executioners, propagandists, sycophants, crooks, liars, clowns, charlatans, dupes and useful idiots -- an institution that dirties and taints everything it touches."
To what extent do the people and activities featured so far provide real solutions? How far do they go toward neutralizing the real enemies? What activities need to be added to increase the prospects for freedom?
Google "permanent tourist" and "perpetual traveler" to find out how some people "escape from the system".
What makes it possible for Hoppe's "gangs of murderers, plunderers and thieves" to effectively run the world, "farming" people as "human livestock", as indicted by Molyneux, and reducing most of the world's human population to the level alluded to by Hoppe as "dupes and useful idiots?"
Is it possible that the vast majority of humans suffer from certain "defects of human nature" that keep them stuck at the level of "dupes and useful idiots?"
Despite so many great minds having promoted freedom for so long, is it possible that freedom as a cause might be hopeless? The iron grip of the "world elite plutonomists" may be too strong to overcome by any freedom activists -- no matter how competent, effective, and efficient they might become... no matter what "freedom activities" they might set in motion... no matter what or how well they might organize... no matter what strategies or tactics they might employ...
On the other hand, it may be possible to create a network or coalition of advanced freedom activists who gain sufficient control over themselves, their own lives, and enough key resources to...? (Open Question?)
On these pages I use the term "gangster political predator" (GPP). I've previously used the term "terrocrat" (short for "terrorist bureaucrat" or "coercive political agent") GPP and terrocrat are equivalent terms. I use the term "plutonomist" (deriving from "plutonomy") to refer to a member of the "financial/corporate elite". Plutonomists typically use their money power to influence and even control GPPs. I also use the term "civilon" ("civilized human") -- a pejorative term. Civilons include GPPs, plutonomists, and their believers and supporters, as well as most of their "beneficiaries". The terms GPP, plutonomist, and civilon always refer to individual human beings. Taking cues from Molyneux and Hoppe, I also use the terms "human livestock" ("sheeple?") and "useful idiots". Most civilons (civilized people) can be described as human livestock, sheeple, dupes, or useful idiots.
"If you make yourselves sheep, the wolves will eat you." -- Benjamin Franklin
I invite freedom activists to advance further beyond the level of "civilized sheep" to become "FreeWeavers" who create "Freedorder".
The concept of "Potential Game-Change Factor" (PGCF) is most important. If, in their efforts to promote freedom, freedom activists were to focus on addressing PGCFs -- factors that have the potential to "change the game" -- they could reap much greater rewards for their efforts.
More websites can be found by searching online for "militia movement", "militia groups", "secession movement", "nullification movement", "freedom activist", "liberty activist", "freedom radio", "liberty radio", "patriot radio", "tax freedom", "overthrow government", "sovereign citizen", "sovereign americans", "common law citizen", "common law society", "free americans", "jural society", "ron paul", "tea party", "ayn rand", "objectivism", "libertarian organizations", "libertarian activist", "libertarian radio", "anarchist", "anarchist radio", "anarcho-capitalism", "spontaneous order", "brainwashing", "propaganda", "unlearning", "unschooling", "deschooling", "daniel quinn", "disinformation", "underground economy", "health freedom", "drug freedom", "free banking", "tom greco", "john zube", "panarchy", "alternative currency", "ec riegel", "barter system", "federal reserve scam", "gold as money", "silver as money", "monetary freedom", etc.
Many websites have links to other related sites. Some websites have forums where it may be possible to find freedom activists who could be persuaded to check out the "Cox strategy" and other aspects of World Freedom Challenge (WFC).
The essence of the "Cox strategy" is to create alternatives to corrupt "plutonomist-GPP systems". The expectation is that when the latter fail, there will be viable systems to take their place. Maybe the "Cox strategy" can be used as a model to also create voluntary alternatives in other areas.
Weavers of freeorder are pattern seers, connection makers, thinkers, artists, entrepreneurs who work for all who discover that their home is Open Network.
Open Network names a freeorder comprised of and arising from all aspects of the world in which an explorer of sovereign spirit may rejoice.
It is very old. No one invented it.
Freeorder is a balance among designed and spontaneous orders conducive to quest.
Quest is an aesthetics governed pattern of explorations in course of which resonance grows.
Resonance is the expectation of magic.
Magic is emergent, an awareness arising from a fusing through present action of intensity, sensitivity, integrity, and wonder.
Such capabilities of human beings are the reason why Open Network came into being, why it continues to exist, and why it is inextinguishable.
Leif Smith, March 8, 2000. Copyright © 2000, Pattern Research, All rights reserved. Permission is given to view, copy, print, and distribute this document. Please tell people it was written by Leif Smith, and include his contact information: Leif Smith, Pattern Research, PO Box 9100, Denver, Colorado 80209, USA; leif@pattern.com; 303.778.0880; 303.722.2680 (fax).
The term "FreeWeaver" was inspired by Leif Smith of The Explorers Foundation. I use the term "FreeWeaver" and demarcate several "levels" of FreeWeavers:
See also: Respecting Levels of Freedom.
I envisage a FreeWeaver Network -- a "horizontal organization" -- a Freeorder.
FreeWeavers "pay" themselves.
A FreeWeaver could be responsible for maintaining one or more Build Freedom pages. He or she could use these pages to promote products, services, and/or programs.
A FreeWeaver could have his or her own pages on BuildFreedom and use them as described above.
The following kinds of FreeWeaver Associates are wanted:
If interested, please email Frederick Mann.
For World Freedom Challenge (WFC) news, updates, and questions, please subscribe to the 10X Freedom Initiative and introduce yourself. Feel free to ask questions and provide comments and suggestions.
Google web/video search results (Nov-Dec 07) indicate potential participants in FreeWeaver projects -- particularly "people outside mainstream" -- or people willing to consider unconventional and controversial ideas. (Note: "15,400,000 / 28,446" denotes 15,400,000 web results and 28,446 video results.)
The significance of these statistics is that there are thousands (sometimes millions) of web pages and hundreds (sometimes thousands) of online videos related to certain topics. Some of the videos have been watched by millions of people, e.g., "Collateral Murder". Many of these people may be prospective participants in FreeWeaver Projects.
That certain videos have been watched by millions of people demonstrates that someone can make a video and then use the Internet to get millions of people to watch that video.
YouTube provides information you can use to identify (and often contact) people who like a particular video.
Because they ridicule both PGGs and their religious counterparts, anyone who appreciates George Carlin and/or Bill Maher may be a prospect for FreeWeaver Projects.
(Items preceded by an em-dash (—), below, added during Nov-Dec 08.)
(Note: "12,500 / 2" denotes 12,500 web results and 2 video results from Google searches. Items preceded by an em-dash (—) above, were added during Nov-Dec 08. The others were added during Nov-Dec 07.)
The above numbers can be used to get an idea of what people are interested in, and what they are sufficiently interested in to make videos and post them online. You can use them to design a FreeWeaver Project, to get an idea of how many people might be interested in a particular FreeWeaver Project, and to decide how to present and promote the project. You can get statistics of how often any particular video has been viewed.
Some people upload large numbers of videos to YouTube. Some of these people have significant numbers of subscribers.
As as an example, a FreeWeaver Project could be designed to appeal to Ron Paul supporters (note how "his numbers" have grown from Nov-Dec 07 to Nov-Dec 08). The Internet, particularly YouTube, can be used to contact Ron Paul supporters. Many Ron Paul supporters may be disappointed with his 2008 election results, and may be open to participate in other projects.
(The numbers for "The Secret" may reflect the prevalence of magical thinking and the gullibility of the "Oprah crowd".)
The "Cox strategy" featured in the Introduction, if implemented more widely, could become a Potential Game-Change Factor (PGCF).
Following is a chart computed by dividing the change in US GDP by the change in US Debt:
Nathan Martin describes it as "THE Most Important Chart of the CENTURY" and "the elephant in the room that nobody sees or can describe". He also writes:
"What it shows is how much productivity is gained by infusing $1 of debt into our debt backed money system.
Back in the early 1960s a dollar of new debt added almost a dollar to the nation's output of goods and services. As more debt enters the system the productivity gained by new debt diminishes. This produced a path that was following a diminishing line targeting ZERO in the year 2015. This meant that we could expect that each new dollar of debt added in the year 2015 would add NOTHING to our productivity.
Then a funny thing happened along the way. Macroeconomic DEBT SATURATION occurred causing a phase transition with our debt relationship. This is because total income can no longer support total debt. In the third quarter of 2009 each dollar of debt added produced NEGATIVE 15 cents of productivity, and at the end of 2009, each dollar of new debt now SUBTRACTS 45 cents from GDP!
This is mathematical PROOF that debt saturation has occurred. Continuing to add debt into a saturated system, where all money is debt, leads only to future defaults and to higher unemployment."
You may want to Google "debt saturation" and form your own conclusions about the implications of the chart. If debt as a tool to increase economic production no longer works, or works far less well than it used to, this could be a PGCF.
Next, you may want to check out the Grandfather Economic Report by Michael Hodges.
The so-called "soviet union" collapsed because of PGCFs. Could the same happen to the "american empire?"
Juan Enriquez says some important things about the prospect of hyperinflation wiping out the "US$". According to Roger Gallo, "Juan Enriquez implies that there will soon be a new species of humanoid."
Roger Gallo has published Harry Browne's Freedom Principles By Frederick Mann. Studying and implementing such principles could constitute a PCCF at the individual level.
Roger Gallo has also written an article "TED - Reduce The Role Of Government", featuring a video by UK politician David Cameron, leader of the Conservative Party: "The next age of government". To watch the video on YouTube, Click Here.
While Cameron says some important things about debt and transparency, and it may be expedient for some freedom activists and even FreeWeavers to support the likes of Cameron, some issues may be important:
During April, 2010, Michele Bachmann (so-called "republican representative of Minnesota") used the term "gangster government". Bill Clinton objected to this with the phrase "elected officials", implying that because certain people were "elected" they were not gangsters. Questions:
In many parts of the world, children are forced into so-called "schools" where they're brainwashed and conditioned to become "government slaves". If the methodology or technology could be developed to enable them to free themselves from political brainwashing, this would be a PGCF.
Part of "human nature" can be regarded as a "Primitive Political Animal Mentality" (PPAM). Part of PPAM is the "Pecking Order Bully System" (POBS) program referred to above. If the methodology or technology could be developed to enable humans to transcend their PPAM, this would be a PGCF.
The book Why We Lie: The Evolutionary Roots of Deception and the Unconscious Mind by David Livingston Smith reveals important aspects of "human nature". The likes of Cameron and Obama may be oblivious to most of their own lies. Most humans are duped by the lies of Cameron and Obama -- most likely including author Smith himself! This gullibility is part of PPAM. If the methodology or technology could be developed to enable humans to recognize the lies of the likes of Cameron and Obama, this would be a PGCF.
Consider a hypothetical world in which people in corporations didn't steal money from their employees ("tax withholding") on behalf of GPPs, and didn't snitch on their employees by sending "earnings reports" to GPPs. In such a world it would be more difficult and expensive for GPPs to steal ("collect taxes"). If GPPs could persuade or compel people in corporations to steal on their behalf and snitch on their employees, would this be a PGCF for GPPs?
If large numbers (not limited to freedom activists and FreeWeavers) could earn a living in ways not subject to "corporate theft on behalf of GPPs", would this be a PGCF?
If freedom activists and FreeWeavers were to focus on identifying PGCFs and acting on the most promising ones... (Open Question?)
If enough people (sheeple?) could find out that they're effectively being farmed like livestock by GPPs (and often by plutonomists) -- see Stefan Molyneux's The Story of Your Enslavement -- would this be a PGCF?
The idea of "free agency" is that individuals become financially independent so they can spend more time on improving themselves and expanding freedom. For an elaboration, see Mark Joyner's Construct One - The Freedom Agent.
Mark Joyner has also created Simpleology 101, which is available free, and can be applied to learn to take more efficient, effective, and productive actions.
Also relevant here is Mark Joyner's Construct Zero - Unifying Social Dynamics.
Did you know that over 25 million Americans are now self-employed? If you want to be your own boss, you may want to get the excellent book Free Agent Nation: The Future of Working for Yourself by Daniel H. Pink. The following quote is most important:
If actions are the architecture of our lives, premises are the plumbing. You can't see them -- but like the pipes or wiring that snake invisibly through a home, they determine the capabilities of the structure and the efficiency of its performance. Stick with me on this analogy, because it's about to get slightly weird. Imagine that a few strange people crept into your home while you wer on vacation, and replaced your electrical system with solar power. Then suppose they removed the concrete foundation and substituted wheels. And say they also decided that your second bathroom ought to be a mini baskeball court -- so they redid the plumbing and added a hardwood floor and a hoop. When you returned from vacation, your house might look outwardly like the three-bedroom, two-bath colonial you departed two weeks before. But what you really got is a solar-powered, mobile home with an indoor arena. And that will affect both the possibilities and limits of the family manse.
Free agency is like those odd architectural interlopers. Quietly it has rewired the circuitry and remodeled the structures on which our social, cultural, and economic house is built. It's here -- deep in the realm of premises and first principles -- that free agency is having its greatest impact. It has already begun overturning a dozen central assumptions about contemporary American work and life.
Pink examines 12 premises, including: "The free agent economy makes workers less secure and Rampant individualism is fraying our social fabric."
Free Agent Nation Table of Contents:Prologue
Part 1 Welcome to Free Agent NationChapter 1. Bye, Bye, Organization GuyPart 2 The Free Agent Way
Chapter 2. How Many Are There? The Numbers and Nuances of Free Agency
Chapter 3. How Did It Happen? The Four Ingredients of Free AgencyChapter 4. The New Work EthicPart 3 How (and Why) Free Agency Works
Chapter 5. The New Employment Contract
Chapter 6. The New Time ClockChapter 7. Small Groups, Big Impact: Reinventing Togetherness in Free Agent NationPart 4 Free Agent Woes
Chapter 8. Getting Horizontal: The Free Agent Org Chart and Operating System
Chapter 9. The Free Agent Infrastructure
Chapter 10. Matchmakers, Agents, and Coaches
Chapter 11. Free Agent FamiliesChapter 12. Roadblocks on Free Agent Avenue: Health Insurance, Taxes, and ZoningPart 5 The Free Agent Future
Chapter 13. Temp Slaves, Permatemps, and the Rise of Self-Organized LaborChapter 14. E-tirement: Free Agency and the New Old AgeEpilogue
Chapter 15. School's Out: Free Agency and the Future of Education
Chapter 16. Location, Location ... Vocation: Free Agency and the Future of Offices, Homes, and Real Estate
Chapter 17. Putting the "I" in IPO: The Path Toward Free Agent Finance
Chapter 18. A Chip Off the Old Voting Bloc: The New Politics of Free Agency
Chapter 19. What's Left: Free Agency and the Future of Commerce, Careers, and Community
The Official Free Agent Nation Resource Guide
Notes
Appendix - Results of the Free Agent Nation Online Census
Acknowledgments
Index
In his superb classic How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World, Harry Browne defines freedom as living your life as you want to live it. He claims that you can enjoy a high degree of freedom right now. Among other "traps", he identifies:
Government Trap #1: The belief that governments perform socially useful functions that deserve your support.
Government Trap #2: The belief that you have a duty to obey laws.
Government Trap #3: The belief that the government can be counted upon to carry out a social reform you favor.
Government Trap #4: The fear that the government is so powerful that it can prevent you from being free.
For some additional "traps" that tend to reduce individual freedom, see HARRY BROWNE'S FREEDOM PRINCIPLES.
Harry Browne's "traps" are all premises at the level of the hidden plumbing of a house.
The following has been extracted from A Way to Be Free by Robert LeFevre:
How can one individual assist in maximizing human well being by advancing the cause of liberty? His first task is to learn his true nature.
1. Each of us has the ability to think and act as he pleases.
2. Each of us controls his own energy. We do it wisely or foolishly, but we do it individually. We may act on the advice or the command of others. Or we may decide not to. Our own energies remain under our individual command and control.
3. It follows that I cannot make you free; I can earn my own freedom by controlling myself instead of trying to control others.
4. What steps do I take when I wish to be free?
5. I free myself from dependency on others when that dependency is created or maintained by force. Since there is no way that I can survive without the help of others, I will always be dependent to some degree. But I can depend upon the voluntary support others provided when they willingly buy my goods or services. If I have to compel them to buy my goods or services -- either directly at the point of a gun, or indirectly through governmental avenues -- then I am acting in a way that is counter-productive and anti-freedom.
6. Having recognized this point, I break off all relations with government.
- I will make no contribution to any political campaign or political party.
- I will endorse no issue and no candidate.
- I will not vote.
- I will de-register and refuse to participate in government-sponsored proceedings of any sort.
- I will not run for office, nor hold a political job even if asked.
- I will patronize those persons and firms that have the least to do with government.
- If a firm or individual is heavily subsidized by the government, I will have nothing to do with it; it is an arm of the State.
- I will not ask for government help, guidance, advice, money, or emolument of any kind.
- I will accept no government check for Social Security, welfare, injury, pension, or for any difficulty I may be in. I will solve my own problems.
- I will set my own standards in such a way that I impose on no one.
- I will injure no one for any reason.
- I will be as generous and helpful to others as my ability makes possible.
- I will live up to every contractual agreement I voluntarily enter into.
- I will, therefore, take great care to only enter into those agreements that are worthy of fulfillment.
- I will be true to the highest and best within me, committing no act of theft, dishonesty, or violence against any other human whatsoever.
See also:
To some people, working at a job in a corporation is "economically correct".
See:By "personal power" I refer to the ability to work; to take actions that achieve goals; to influence others.
Mark Joyner's Simpleology 101, which is available free, can be applied to learn to take more efficient, effective, and productive actions, i.e., increase personal power.
See also: How to Achieve and Increase Personal Power. At the end of this report there are a number of links to related reports.
And: Wake Up America! The Dynamics of Human Power.
It may be possible for some freedom activists to increase their personal power by a factor of 10. See: Software For Your Brain by Dr. Michael Hewitt-Gleeson.
For some people it may be very worthwhile to periodically "Reboot Your Brain and Improve Your Whole Life!"
Some people may benefit from taking steps that physically improve their brain functioning:
Most people, including some freedom activists, have been brainwashed (or conditioned) to a point that they suffer to a greater or lesser degree from "learned helplessness", powerlessness, and obedience to "subjective social agreement". They may accept as valid, and be constrained by, some of the Premises and Traps listed and linked to under "Free Agency".
When a professional deprogrammer rescues a cult member from, say, Scientology, he or she applies some kind of "deprogramming methodology" to induce the cult member to "snap" out of his or her "Scientology mindset" and to snap back into "subjective social agreement". It may be possible to develop a deprogramming methodology to rescue and induce people to snap out of "subjective social agreement".
Below, under Howard Bloom's Lucifer Principle, you can read: "Our cultures... are our collective fantasies about the worlds we cannot see [emphasis added]. They are tapestries of memes". Most people, including some freedom activists, as they become "socialized" or "enculturated", come to agree that certain things are "real", even if they cannot see them or perceive them otherwise. Their ability to use their senses to discern reality may become impaired, particularly in the areas of politics and religion.
Some psychologists use the term "socialization without reflection". Most people, including some freedom activists, are to various degrees trapped by "social/political conditioning". Maybe Brain Entrainment methods could be developed to help people, including freedom activists (where applicable), to deprogram themselves.
Technologies and ideas similar or related to the following could be combined:
| Condition | Deaths |
| Adverse Drug Reactions | 106,000 |
|---|---|
| Medical error | 98,000 |
| Bedsores | 115,000 |
| Infection | 88,000 |
| Malnutrition | 108,800 |
| Unnecessary Procedures | 37,136 |
| Surgery-Related | 32,000 |
| TOTAL | 783,936 |
Because it's easier to steal than produce, you may suspect that there could be many rackets. A further factor is that human lying, deception, and self-deception are widespread, as revealed in the books below:
The above is a small sample! Many more "racket books" can be found by searching for "Mafia", "racket", "extortion", "corruption", "scam", "hoax", "con", "banking", "corporation", "pollution", "IRS", "CIA", "FBI", "FDA", "conspiracy", "fraud", "expose", "deceit", etc.
Three Stages of Human Development:
Although it may be a gross oversimplification, "barbarism" can be regarded as the "state of affairs" before humans became organized into so-called "nation states" with so-called "governments". Among many "pre-civilized" people, there was a great deal of tribal warfare. The following table is from Steven Pinker's The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature. It depicts the percentage of male deaths resulting from tribal warfare for a number of primitive tribes.
The bottom item on the table is for "US & Europe -- 20th Century."
A most important "organizing principle" of Barbarism is the "Pecking Order Bully System" (POBS). You can observe POBS in action by watching wild-animal TV programs about baboons, lions, etc.
Pinker basically argues that concentrating the use of violence in a so-called "government" is a good idea because it reduced warfare deaths by 95%. He gives a number of 100 million killed during the 20th Century by "government warfare". If it hadn't been for civilization's so-called "nation states" and so-called "governments", the number of warfare deaths would have been 2 billion!
Steven Pinker: A brief history of violence
According to R.J. Rummel, DEMOCIDE = MURDER BY GOVERNMENT:
"Just to give perspective on this incredible murder by government [262,000,000 from 1900 to 1999], if all these bodies were laid head to toe, with the average height being 5', then they would circle the earth ten times. Also, this democide murdered 6 times more people than died in combat in all the foreign and internal wars of the century."
If you add Rummel's number for the people who died in combat to his 262 million number, you get over 300 million -- about three times Pinker's number.
"All murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." -- Voltaire
Humans in civilizations are generally called "citizens". I use the term "civilon" for "civilized human". Civilons actively engage in democide as described by Rummel. Or they passively support GPPs who perpetrate democide. Typically, civilons think "democracy is a good thing" -- no matter how many get killed.
(Daniel Jonah Goldhagen is the author of Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust and Worse Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism and the Ongoing Assault on Humanity. Goldhagen points out that typically "political leaders do little or nothing to stop genocide." Is this similar to indicating that Al Capone and John Gotti did nothing to stop mafia murders?)
A most important "organizing principle" of civilization is the "Pecking Order Bully System" (POBS). You can observe POBS in action by watching wild-animal TV programs about baboons, lions, etc. -- and by observing civilons engaged in political elections. The 2008 election campaign between Obama and McCain was essentially the same as two (civilized) baboons beating their chests and shouting insults at each other to prove who was the "best bully".
At the end of the election, millions of Obama supporters hooted and hollered like (civilized) baboons because their favorite bully had been elected to the top of the "Pecking Order Bully System" (POBS), called the "US Federal Government". All these civilons were completely unaware that they were unconsciously acting out their primitive and deep-seated POBS programs.
Headline in the Arizona Republic of 12/1/08: "Citizens are new slaves to government masters."
Civilons are partial slaves. Their bullies tell them what they may or may not eat and drink. Their bullies force them to send their children to "concentration campuses for brainwashing" -- see Dumbed Down by "Education! Their GPP bullies force them to pay a percentage of their earnings to their GPPs. If this is 50%, then the civilons are essentially "50% slaves".
From the Preface to Foundations of Psychohistory by Lloyd DeMause:
"The "psychogenic theory of history" which I set out in this book is simple to understand, though often difficult to believe. It can be summarized as the theory that history involves the acting-out by adults of group-fantasies which are based on motivations initially produced by the evolution of childhood."
It may be difficult for many (civilized) grown-ups to confront the proposition that much of what they regard as "rational life activities" could be better described as "adults acting-out group-fantasies rooted in maltreatment and abuse during childhood, as well as stemming from primitive animal programs in their brains!"
"...[R]eligions are best envisioned as a socially constructed haven for delusions that are not diagnosed as insanity due to majority acceptance. Those same beliefs would, however, receive the diagnosis of insanity if they were to appear outside of a religious framework." -- John F. Schumaker (The Corruption of Reality: A Unified Theory of Religion, Hypnosis, and Psychopathology)
Consider the proposition that 100% of "human religious belief and behavior" constitutes the pathological acting-out of group-fantasies!
Book: Wings of Illusion: The Origin, Nature and Future of Paranormal Belief by John F. Schumaker. Review on Amazon.com by Charles D. Hayes:
"Understanding the nature of human belief systems is one of my principal preoccupations. I've read scores of books on this subject, and find John F. Schumaker to be in a league of his own in this discipline. He writes about beliefs with as much insight and clarity as Bryan Magee does with the complexities of philosophy. This book is timeless."
Book: The Corruption of Reality: A Unified Theory of Religion, Hypnosis, and Psychopathology by John F. Schumaker. Review on Amazon.com by Yahzi:
"This book is the most important book of the entire 20th century. Like Freud, it will define the next 100 years of psychological thinking. Unlike Freud, it will last beyond that, because it is more than visionary, it is also grounded in hard science.
If you ever wanted to understand how educated, rational adults can believe in the stupidest things imaginable, this book explains it.
The only weak point of the book is the final chapter, where Schumaker suggests we create a false religion to safely guide people's evolutionarily inescapable stupidity. This is John's own corruption of reality: thinking that we can actually find a painless solution. But he presents it half-heartedly enough that I think even he understands it will never work.
The only solution is expecting people to grow up and act like adults. [emphasis added] Life isn't what you wanted it to be -- tough. Deal.
To put it another way: when you think about it long enough, this book explains 9/11, why we are in Iraq, and the current flap over Intelligent Design. That's a heck of an accomplishment for a book written many years ago."
Does the Schumaker quote on religion also apply to politics?: "Politics is best envisioned as a socially constructed haven for delusions that are not diagnosed as insanity due to majority acceptance. Those same beliefs would, however, receive the diagnosis of insanity if they were to appear outside of a political framework."
Consider the possibility that civilons tend to suffer from religious and/or political delusions that result in some unpleasant consequences... including over 300 million violent deaths during the 20th Century.
Consider the proposition that 100% of "human coercive political behavior" constitutes the pathological acting-out of group-fantasies!
Civilization should be regarded as a Dark Age of human history, as depicted in the book Dark Ages: The Case for a Science of Human Behavior by Lee McIntyre, from which I quote brief excerpts:
Civilons (civilized people) can be described as "human livestock" farmed by GPPs and plutonomists -- "gangs of murderers, plunderers and thieves, surrounded by willing executioners, propagandists, sycophants, crooks, liars, clowns, charlatans, dupes and useful idiots."
One of the purposes of this website is to persuade individuals -- particularly freedom activists -- to become FreeWeavers who create Freeorder in general, and/or narrower specific Freeorders such as alternative currency/payment systems. Becoming a FreeWeaver may involve several steps. It's up to each prospective FreeWeaver to decide which steps he or she needs to take to become a FreeWeaver:
Consider the possibility that practically all humans have a powerful and deep-seated "Pecking Order Bully System" (POBS) program, inherited from our animal ancestors. If so, it would be automatic behavior for most people to create hierarchies and to position themselves within these hierarchies. Many people might feel lost if/when they're not part of a POBS hierarchy.
An aspect of the POBS program may be: "The word of the top bully is law". This may be so deep-seated and entrenched that it's very difficult, if at all possible, for most civilons to let go the absurd notion that "government makes laws."
Now, consider the possibility that many top plutonomists and GPPs are effectively positioned in POBS hierarchies where the top bully is someone in Big-Finance and/or Big-Business. If so, then some of the "Biggest Bullies" would be in Big-Finance and/or Big-Business, and some top GPPs would really be "Lesser Bullies" in their respective POBS hierarchies.
The "corporate media" can be regarded as an important "speaking mouth" of Big-Finance, Big-Business, and GPPs. Many journalists are situated in POBS hierarchies -- and they follow orders from the bullies above them.
Author and filmmaker John Pilger has documented a great deal about journalism and the world's "financial/corporate masters". He also writes some interesting things about Obama.
In Gerry Spence's book From Freedom to Slavery: The Rebirth of Tyranny in America, Chapter 5 is titled: "The New King -- The Tyranny of the Corporate Core", from which I quote below. I've replaced Spence's term "entities" with "pretendities", which I regard as a more apt term. (Many people have been brainwashed that certain "pretendities" -- like "Santa Claus who lives at the North Pole" -- exist as real entities. See Pretendities).
"In furtherance of our conclusion that Earthlings suffer bizarre aberrations of the mind, we report the following: There exists on earth a host of controlling pretendities called "corporations". However, try as we may, we have been unable to demonstrate that these pretendities are alive, that they breathe or feel or that they physically exist. These corporations appear to have no life as we understand life. They seem interested in but one thing, a lifeless paper symbol that measures the worth of all things and all Earthlings -- something Earthlings call "money."
Although corporations do not breathe, they are said to breathe money. Although they have no blood, their blood is said to be money. Although they have no brains, they are said to think money, and although they have no visible mouths, they speak only in terms of money. Although corporations do not live, their lives are devoted to the gathering of money, and although they are soulless, their souls are said to be composed totally of money. It remains an enigma to us that any but the insane could devote the labor of their entire lives to such non-beings. By means of the corporate-owned media, closely censored information is disseminated that portrays the corporate oligarchy as honest and just and also convinces the people it is proper for non-living pretendities to own or control the entire wealth of the earth while the living should be allowed only that which "trickles down". So convinced are the Earthlings of this religion called "free enterprise" that they willingly lay down their lives and the lives of their children to protect the oligarchy that continues to exploit them. ["Oligarchy" denotes a Pecking Order Bully System (POBS) with a small number of bullies at the top. "Plutocracy" denotes a POBS with rich bullies at the top.]
...the people are not aware that a New King reigns. They are vaguely cognizant, of course, that there are clusters of monstrous corporate pretendities that seem to control them, but they are no more sensitive to the ubiquitous nature of their enslavement than they are of the unrelenting pull of gravity. In fact, they seem to unconsciously fear their independence of these corporate pretendities, this New King of theirs, in the same way they might fear the loss of their subjugation to the gravitational pull of the earth -- that if gravity were extinguished they might suddenly find themselves flying free with no means by which to affix their feet to the soil."
Chapter 9 of From Freedom to Slavery: The Rebirth of Tyranny in America, Chapter 5 is titled: "Redesigning the Human Mind -- The Tyranny of the Media", from which the following is quoted:
The following is from the end of the Epilogue of The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition into the Forces of History by Howard Bloom:
"Superorganisms ["family", "tribe", "country", "nation", "state", "government", etc.], ideas ["killer memes"], and the pecking order -- the triad of human evil -- are not inventions "programmed" into us by Western society, consumerism, capitalism, television violence, blood-and-guts films, or rock and roll. They are built into our physiology. They have been with us since the dawn of the human race.
But there is hope that we may be able someday free ourselves of savagery. To our species, evolution has given something new -- the imagination. With that gift, we have dreamed of peace. Our task -- perhaps the only one that will save us -- is to turn what we have dreamed into reality. To fashion a world where violence ceases to be. If we can accomplish this goal, we may yet escape our fate as highly precocious offspring, as fitting inheritors of nature's highest gift and foulest curse, as the ultimate children of the Lucifer Principle."
The main idea of this section is that there may be certain "innate factors" in practically all humans that tend to make us "psychologically reversed at a social level". Howard Bloom has identified his "triad of human evil":
I speculate that practically all humans have in their brains certain "Primitive Animal Programs" (PAPs). One such PAP can be called the "Pecking Order Bully System" (POBS) program. If another "Big Bully" -- like Hitler -- were to appear, how many humans would obediently follow him and become his willing subjects? And would this be similar to a pack of baboons obediently following their "Big Bully Alpha Male" and becoming his willing subjects?
According to R.J. Rummel, DEMOCIDE = MURDER BY GOVERNMENT:
"Just to give perspective on this incredible murder by government [262,000,000 from 1900 to 1999], if all these bodies were laid head to toe, with the average height being 5', then they would circle the earth ten times. Also, this democide murdered 6 times more people than died in combat in all the foreign and internal wars of the century."
If you add Rummel's number for the people who died in combat to his 262 million number, you get over 300 million. Psychological reversal on a grand scale?
"All murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." -- Voltaire
In Dark Ages: The Case for a Science of Human Behavior, Lee McIntyre writes: "How can we be so cruel to one another? Why are such things allowed to happen? ...But the worst thing to realize is that such atrocities continue largely because we tolerate them or because those of us who will not tolerate them do not know where to turn for answers. Can anything be done to stop such modern evils? What are the causal forces behind them?"
For humanity to progress beyond our "Current Dark Age", it may be necessary to identify -- in addition to Bloom's "triad of human evil" -- more "Causal Forces". What if Bloom has only scratched the surface? The following books may identify more than Bloom has recognized:
Maybe a "Network of Weavers of Freeorder" -- see The Explorers Foundation ("The Explorers Foundation exists to build a world fit for explorers and to fit ourselves to inhabit such a world.") -- to attempt to move humanity out of its "Current Dark Age" -- to take practical steps to "fashion a world where violence ceases to be" (Bloom).
The following are extracts from Bloom's The Lucifer Principle [with some comments added]:
These videos focus on how Sigmund Freud's ideas have been used by politicians and business people to control, manipulate, and exploit the public:
In Carl Rogers on Personal Power, the author quotes from Sigmund Freud's Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego:
"A group is extraordinarily credulous and open to influence. It has no critical faculty... Anyone who wishes to produce an effect upon it needs no logical adjustment to his arguments; he must paint in the most forcible colors, he must exaggerate, and he must repeat the same thing again and again...
It respects force and can only be slightly influenced by kindness, which it regards merely as a form of weakness... It wants to be ruled and oppressed, and to fear its masters...
And finally, groups have never thirsted after truth. They demand illusions, and cannot do without them. They constantly give what is unreal precedence over what is real; they are almost as strongly influenced by what is untrue as by what is true. They have an evident tendency not to distinguish between the two...
A group is an obedient herd, which could never live without a master. It has such a thirst for obedience that it submits instinctively to anyone who appoints himself as its master."
There may be tens of millions of people in the world ready to move "beyond civilization."
See "Daniel Quinn" and "Beyond Civilization" under Potential Market Leverage Segments.
Ishmael: An Adventure of Mind and Spirit, by Daniel Quinn
Continue to WFC - Part 2 - Use Humor as a Weapon to Undermine Gangster Political Predators (GPPs) ... or read on...
Is freedom gaining ground? Or losing?
Who has the upper hand: freedom violators or freedom activists?
If freedom activists became ten times more effective, would we be able to turn things around?
Are freedom organizations growing fast enough and are they effective enough to make the impact necessary for freedom to win?
In your head you may have a "program" about how fast your achievements, your business, your organization, and/or your earnings can grow. "10% per year" is a typical "growth program". If you have such a program in your brain, it almost forces you you to think and act in ways that limit you to "10%-per-year" growth. It's a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy!
At what rate have freedom organizations been growing in terms of size and effectiveness? ... More than 10% per year?
What would happen if the principals, personnel, and members of freedom organizations -- and many individual freedom activists -- became ten times more effective?
Many freedom activists may have a "rate-of-growth" program in their brains that limits their thinking and actions, holding them back. This may also apply to you personally.
In 1984, Jack Welch who was then Chairman of General Electric Corporation, was introduced to the "ten-times-growth" (10X) program. Over a period of 18 months, starting in 1985 when GE was a $30 billion company, the "10X-growth" program was introduced to thousands of GE managers. By 1988, GE had grown into a $300 billion company, and as a result GE's shareholder value had grown ten times!
If you are not yet utilizing the "ten-times-growth" (10X) program, we're happy to tell you that FREE TRAINING (via email) is available.
We're launching the 10X Freedom Initiative. Initially it consists of a forum/community where freedom activists who are doing the 10X training, or have completed it, discuss the training and how they might apply it to become 10 times more effective as freedom activists.
Out of the 10X Freedom Initiative, could develop a freedom organization or business that provides services such as:
Do you want the FREE "ten-times-growth" (10X) training?
The training consists of 35 interactive lessons. There are no fees of any kind. The success of the 10X approach is based on a few basic principles:
More good news! FREE Sales X 10 training (called NewSell and consisting of 15 interactive lessons) is now also available.
"Delighted you have created this autoresponder system... I highly endorse Michael's information... I'm now doing his NewSell and SOT Instructors Training Courses... Applying the knowledge has much more than X10d my student enrollment in the Georgian Bay Success Academy, and drastically increased my earnings..." -- Darlene Sartore 812-779-3617 (Central Time)
See: BECOME A 10X PERFORMING PERSON!
Acknowledgment: As far as we know, Andrew J. Galambos was the first to use the terms "build freedom" and "building freedom".
[Site snapshot on] Monday, August 11, 2014. Today's Freedom Quote:
"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves." - Abraham Lincoln
Freedom quotes from other days (a random selection from one of these was shown on the home-page each day):
"When you take charge of your life, there is no longer a need to ask permission of other people or society at large. When you ask permission, you give someone veto power over your life". -- Geoffrey F. Abert
"Mankind is at its best when it is most free. This will be clear if we grasp the principle of liberty. We must recall that the basic principle of liberty is freedom of choice, which saying many have on their lips but few in their minds." -- Dante Alighieri
"Conquering any difficulty always gives one a secret joy, for it means pushing back a boundary-line and adding to one's liberty." -- Henri Frédéric Amiel
"In a recent conversation with an official at the Internal Revenue Service, I as amazed when he told me that 'If the taxpayers of this country ever discover that the IRS operates on 90% bluff, the entire system will collapse'". -Henry Bellmon, Senator (1969)
"Language exerts hidden power, like a moon on the tides." -- Rita Mae Brown, Starting From Scratch, 1988
"The true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedients, and by parts ... the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke
"Man is free, but not if he does not believe it." -- Casanova
"The thought of how far the human race would have advanced without government simply staggers the imagination." -- Doug Casey 1979
"If you assume that there's no hope, you guarantee that there will be no hope. If you assume that there is an instinct for human freedom, there are opportunities to change things, there's a chance you may contribute to making a better world. That's your choice." -- Noam Chomsky
"He who will not reason is a bigot; he who cannot is a fool; and he who dares not is a slave." -- William Drummond, 1585-1649
"The Roman government gave them bread and circuses. Today we give them bread and elections..." - Will Durant
"I know but one freedom, and that is the freedom of the mind." -- Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"Our greatest battles are that with our own minds." -- Jameson Frank
"The government solution to a problem is usually as bad as the problem." -- Milton Friedman
"... power can mean one of two things, domination or potency. Far from being identical, these two qualities are mutually exclusive. Impotence, using the term not only with regard to the sexual sphere but to all spheres of human potentialities, results in the sadistic striving for domination; to the extent to which an individual is potent, that is, able to realize his potentialities on the basis of freedom and integrity of his self, he does not need to dominate and is lacking the lust for power. Power, in the sense of domination, is the perversion of potency, just as sexual sadism is the perversion of sexual love." -- Erich Fromm
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." - Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
"While boasting of our noble deeds, we are careful to conceal the ugly fact that by an iniquitous currency system we have nationalized a system of oppression which, though more refined, is not less cruel than the old system of chattel slavery." -- Horace Greeley
"Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women somehow. When it dies there, no Constitution, no law, no court can save it; no Constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. While it lies there, it needs no Constitution, no law, no court to save it." -- Justice Learned Hand
"If all bank loans were paid ... there would not be a dollar of coin or currency in circulation. Someone has to borrow every dollar we have in circulation. We are absolutely without a permanent money system". - Robert Hemphill, Federal Reserve Bank in Atlanta, in foreword to "100% Money" by Irving Fisher
"By a continuous process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. By this method, they not only confiscate, but they confiscate arbitrarily; and while the process impoverishes many, it actually enriches some... The process engages all of the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner that not one man in a million can diagnose." -- John Maynard Keynes, Economic Consequences of the Peace, 1920
"Freedom means self-control; no more, no less." -- Rose Wilder Lane
"I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." -- James Madison
"If no information or return is filed, [the] Internal Revenue Service cannot assess you". - Gary Makovski, Special IRS Agent, testifying under oath in U.S. v. Lloyd
"Democracy is a form of government that cannot long survive, for as soon as the people learn that they have a voice in the fiscal policies of the government, they will move to vote for themselves all the money in the treasury, and bankrupt the nation". - Karl Marx, 1848 author of "The Communist Manifesto"
"None can love freedom but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license, which never hath more scope than under tyrants." - John Milton
"Education rears disciples, imitators, and routinists, not pioneers of new ideas and creative geniuses. The schools are not nurseries of progress and improvement, but conservatories of tradition and unvarying modes of thought." -- Ludwig von Mises
"The Price of Freedom is Self-Reliance! The Cost is Education!" -- Benjamin T. Moore, Jr.
"The State, completely in its genesis, essentially and almost completely during the first stages of its existence, is a social institution, forced by a victorious group of men on a defeated group, with the sole purpose of regulating the dominion of the victorious group over the vanquished, and securing itself against revolt from within and attacks from abroad. Teleologically, this dominion had no other purpose than the economic exploitation of the vanquished by the victors. No primitive state known to history originated in any other manner." -- Franz Oppenheimer
"Political language... is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind." "But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought." -- George Orwell
"But to tear down a factory or to revolt against a government or to avoid repairs of a motorcycle because it is a system is to attack effects rather than causes; and as long as the attack is upon effects only, no change is possible. The true system, the real system, is our present construction of systematic thought itself, rationality itself. And if a factory is torn down but the rationality which produced it is left standing, then that rationality will simply produce another factory. If a revolution destroys a systematic government, but the systematic patterns of thought that produced that government are left intact, then those patterns will repeat themselves in the succeeding government..." -- Robert M. Pirsig, 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance'
"Wars in old times were made to get slaves. The modern implement of imposing slavery is debt." -- Ezra Pound
"Physical fear of the conqueror turns into psychological dependence; the State is accepted as the supreme power, a god, a protector and dispenser of justice. Its agents assume the aura of a priestly class, in the vestments of authority; and its exactions become irresistible. No longer can subjects question the right of the State to take what it will, for their minds are enslaved along with their bodies. The state is god. The honest dealings of men give way to greed, and greed to glory. The masses are forced not to bake bread but to build pyramids." -- George Roche
"Give me control over a nation's currency and I care not who makes its laws" - Baron M.A. Rothschild (1744 - 1812)
"My schooling not only failed to teach me what it professed to be teaching, but prevented me from being educated to an extent which infuriates me when I think of all I might have learned at home by myself." -- George Bernard Shaw
"Mystical references to "society" and its programs to "help" may warm the hearts of the gullible but what it really means is putting more power in the hands of bureaucrats." -- Thomas Sowell
"Freedom awakens your rage against everything that is not you; egoism calls you to joy over yourselves, to self-enjoyment; freedom is and remains a longing, a romantic plaint, a Christian hope for unearthliness and futurity; ownness is a reality, which of itself removes just so much unfreedom as by barring your own way hinders you. What does not disturb you, you will not want to renounce; and, if it begins to disturb you, why, you know that you must obey yourselves rather than men!" -- Max Stirner
"In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot." - Mark Twain
"All authority is quite degrading. It degrades those who exercise it, and it degrades those over whom it is exercised... The form of government that is most suitable to the artist is no government at all. High hopes were once formed of democracy; but democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people." -- Oscar Wilde
"All we have to do now is to inform the public that the payment of social security taxes is voluntary and watch the mass exodus". - Walter E. Williams, John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA, January 24, 1996
"Progress comes from people who think against the grain. Without nonconformists, you don't advance." -- Saw Ken Wye
"Warriors don't always have to fight. They may just have to stand up." -- Native American Saying
"It is easy to believe that something must be true because everyone else believes it. But the truth often only comes to light by daring to question the unquestionable, by doubting notions which are so commonly believed that they are taken for granted." -- Author Unknown
"Freedom is a package deal - with it comes responsibilities and consequences." -- Author Unknown
"Freedom also includes the right to mismanage your own affairs." -- Author Unknown
"No man is free who is not master of himself." -- Epictetus
"Only the educated are free." -- Epictetus
"The last of the human freedoms is to choose one's attitudes." -- Victor Frankl
"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances - to choose one's own way." -- Victor Frankl
"A society that does not recognize that each individual has values of his own which he is entitled to follow can have no respect for the dignity of the individual and cannot really know freedom." -- F.A. Hayek
"... the argument for liberty is not an argument against organization, which is one of the most powerful tools human reason can employ, but an argument against all exclusive, privileged, monopolistic organization, against the use of coercion to prevent others from doing better." -- F.A. Hayek
"Unless a man has talents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. Of what avail is freedom to choose if the self be ineffectual?" -- Eric Hoffer
"The aspiration toward freedom is the most essentially human of all human manifestations." -- Eric Hoffer
"I am convinced that those societies (as the Indians) which live without government enjoy in their general mass an infinitely greater degree of happiness than those who live under the European governments. Among the former, public opinion is in the place of law, and restrains morals as powerfully as laws ever did anywhere. Among the latter, under pretence of governing they have divided their nations into two classes, wolves and sheep. I do not exaggerate." -- Thomas Jefferson
"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies." -- Thomas Jefferson
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed - and hence clamorous to be led to safety - by menacing them with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken
"Government, in its very essence, is opposed to all increase in knowledge. Its tendency is always towards permanence and against change... The progress of humanity, far from being the result of government, has been made entirely without its aid and in the face of its constant and bitter opposition." -- H.L. Mencken
"People constantly speak of "the government" doing this or that, as they might speak of God doing it. But the government is really nothing but a group of men, and usually they are very inferior men. They may have some better man working for them, but they themselves are seldom worthy of any respect." -- H.L. Mencken
"Economic power is exercised by means of a positive, by offering men a reward, an incentive, a payment, a value; political power is exercised by means of a negative, by the threat of punishment, injury, imprisonment, destruction. The businessman's tool is values; the bureaucrat's tool is fear." -- Ayn Rand
"Whoever claims the right to redistribute the wealth produced by others is claiming the right to treat human beings as chattel." -- Ayn Rand
"Giving money and power to the government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys." -- P. J. O'Rourke
"... Authority has always attracted the lowest elements in the human race. All through history mankind has been bullied by scum. Those who lord it over their fellows and toss commands in every direction and would boss the grass in the meadow about which way to bend in the wind are the most depraved kind of prostitutes. They will submit to any indignity, perform any vile act, do anything to achieve power. ... Every government is a parliament of whores. [We pay them to get screwed?] The trouble is, in a democracy the whores are us." -- P. J. O'Rourke
A man is none the less a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term of years." -- Lysander Spooner
"All political power, so called, rests practically upon this matter of money. Any number of scoundrels, having money enough to start with, can establish themselves as a "government"; because, with money, they can hire soldiers, and with soldiers extort more money; and also compel general obedience to their will. It is with government, as Caesar said it was in war, that money and soldiers mutually supported each other; that with money he could hire soldiers, and with soldiers extort money. So these villains, who call themselves "governments", well understand that their power rests primarily upon money. With money they can hire soldiers, and with soldiers extort money. And, when their pretended "authority" is denied, the first use they always make of money, is to hire soldiers to kill or subdue all who refuse them more money." -- Lysander Spooner
"[W]hoever desires liberty, should understand these vital facts, viz.:
- That every man who puts money into the hands of a "government" (so called), puts into its hands a sword which will be used against him, to extort more money from him, and also to keep him in subjection to its arbitrary will.
- That those who will take his money, without his consent, in the first place, will use it for his further robbery and enslavement, if he presumes to resist their demands in the future.
- That it is a perfect absurdity to suppose that any body of men would ever take a man's money without his consent, for any such object as they profess to take it for, viz., that of protecting him; for why should they wish to protect him, if he does not wish them to do so? To suppose that they would do so, is just as absurd as it would be to suppose that they would take his money without his consent, for the purpose of buying food or clothing for him, when he did not want it.
- If a man wants "protection", he is competent to make his own bargains for it; and nobody has any occasion to rob him, in order to "protect" him against his will.
- That the only security men can have for their political liberty, consists in their keeping their money in their own pockets, until they have assurances, perfectly satisfactory to themselves, that it will be used as they wish it to be used, for their benefit, and not for their injury.
- That no "government", so called, can reasonably be trusted for a moment, or reasonably be supposed to have honest purposes in view, any longer than it depends wholly upon voluntary support." -- Lysander Spooner
"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print.
"I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinions out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone.
"The business of the Journalist is to destroy truth; To lie outright; To pervert; To vilify; To fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the tools and vassals for rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and or lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes." -- John Swinton, the former chief of staff of the "New York Times".
"Our job is to give people not what they want, but what we decide they ought to have". - Richard Salant, former President of CBS News
"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong." -- Voltaire
"It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere." -- Voltaire
Continue to WFC - Part 2 - Use Humor as a Weapon to Undermine Gangster Political Predators (GPPs)
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