RR Phantom
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 |  Subject: The Dos and Don’ts of Talking Liberty - Jeffrey A. Tucker  Tue Sep 19, 2017 12:09 am | |
| Nearly everyone knows there is something wrong with the world as it is. The liberty-minded person believes that he or she knows a major part of what is wrong. There is not enough flexibility and adaptability in the structures of government that presume to manage the social order. State systems have made life rigid and regimented–replete with regulations, taxes, mandates, and prohibitions–with the cost that too many people are excluded, demoralized, and impoverished. For moral and practical reasons, this situation must end.
The vast majority of the human family continues to live under the illusion that giving government more power will magically cure society’s ills. In other words, freedom is the answer.
We recall the moment when we discovered this. The light flicked on. The shades came off and the world looked different from before. Our lives changed. How can we help others arrive at this point?
The short summary of what we believe: the astonishing rise of government power over the course of the last one hundred years has truncated freedoms, human rights, and prosperity along with all the fruits of the human spirit. Government is the main enemy, but government hides under cover of social contract, social justice, democracy, religion, security, and a host of other changing veils.
All of this is clear to those steeped in the tradition of liberty-minded thought as it has gradually emerged over the centuries. But it is obviously not clear to the vast majority of the human family, who continue to live under the illusion that giving government more power will magically cure society’s ills by infusing us with a greater reality of fairness, justice, morality — or whatever they claim.
How best to correct this error? How best to share this knowledge? How best to bring others along to the same understanding?
Here are ten rules–five don’ts and five dos. And I know: every libertarian reader of this article is immediately saying “Don’t tell me what to do!”
1. Don’t Be Belligerent
Righteous anger at the state of the world is a feature of the libertarian mind. It was probably the reason for the initial interest in the ideology. When a person makes the link between war, mass killing, lies, and government power, the result is overwhelming. It seems unimaginable that others do not see this.
One burns with a passion for justice. One feels an intense desire to do something to fix the problem. Another example might be economics related. When a person discovers that the Fed is the reason for inflation, the business cycle, and the skyrocketing debt, the effect is shock and anger and the desire to make history right.
This is all completely understandable. The problem is to remember that others do not share in this anger because they have not been made aware of the cause and effect here. They do not share your understanding. All the dogmatism, belligerence, expressions of anger, and raised voices are not going to convince anyone of the case for liberty. Instead, quite the opposite, they just inspire others to fear your temper and tone.
https://fee.org/articles/the-dos-and-don-ts-talking-liberty/ |
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