A lot of people have trouble being able to see through the distortions in language that are ever-present in modern westernized culture, I know that I was no different for most of my life.
A lot of this is the fault of the very foundation of the American Compulsory Schooling system (refer to John Taylor Gatto for an author who did excellent and extensive work on the history and designated aim of the modern schooling system in the U.S.).
Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric--referred to as The Trivium method--are the great lost tool that were once used to teach young humans how to go about thinking and learning so that they could teach themselves anything and decipher truth from untruth, distortion from reality, bullshit from authenticity. Logic is the tool that is used to see reality for what it is, rather than for what someone teaches you to repeat that it is. It is the tool that allows a free mind to poke holes in what is being handed to them, and the tool that allows someone to determine for themselves what is workable, true, viable, etc, regardless of information they are told to swallow or to regurgitate.
The Greatest Euphemism
One element of language that is lost on many is the Euphemism. Because the average heavily-schooled mind (like the one I possessed for most of my life until recently) is used to deferring to an authority to shape the nature of their reality--their worldview--it often passes right over their head that the label or word they were given for something doesn't at all represent what they were told it represents. If a young person is repeatedly told a word means something it does not, before they are old enough to intellectually defend themselves, the meaning gets swallowed and lost in the abyss of the subconscious.
A euphemism, a word that is indirect and used as a substitute for a harsh and true reality, can be used in many ways, but no greater group engages in euphemisms than the entire gang of "government".
How I Learned To See The Matrix
Part of how I learned to see past linguistic distortion, and see reality, was by looking at the human actions that backed the words I was taught. When I put away the words I was given, just for a bit, long enough to focus on what was occurring in the real world, the blinders fell off. To my horror, I saw the human actions taken by those who called themselves law enforcement, military, and representatives, for what they actually were.
I saw that the police officer behind me with his lights on was not asking me nicely to pull over, he is not respectfully engaging me as a peaceful and innocent human. He is backed with his weapons, and a gang he can call at a moment's notice, and when he puts his lights on I only have one of two choices-- attempt to go on about my day as a free person, or be chased down until deadly force is used against me to either make me comply, throw me in a cage for resisting, or shoot me for trying to live freely, rather than comply with a death threat.
If your option is 1) pull over, or 2) be threatened with deadly force, thrown in a cage, or shot, then you are being aggressed upon, and you are a victim of violence.
I removed the badge, the title, and the uniform, and looked at the action itself of any other human trying to chase down other humans on the road minding their own business, calling friends for back up to subdue them with force, and caging them for trying to keep going on about their day--even killing them sometimes. When I looked at the actions, and realized any human doing that in plain clothes, with no title, would be considered a sick, immoral, barbaric piece of shit-- I saw my own stupidity, and I saw that I was being the most inconsistent a human can be.
Here I would have claimed that violent aggression, theft, harassing strangers who are not bothering you is wrong, and yet I believed that some humans got to do that and it should somehow be considered okay, if enough humans voted for them to be hired by other humans who were voted for.
Important Questions For An Honest Mind
I asked myself: "How the hell is murder, aggression with deadly force, theft, or kidnapping ever moral because some humans voted for that? How is evil legislated into good?"
That, my friends, is a logical impossibility, but because euphemisms were used to blind me my entire life, I had not seen that evil for what it was. I saw murdered innocents in foreign lands as "collateral damage", I saw theft and extortion as "citations, fines, taxation".
In reality, everything government does is backed by the threat of deadly force. If you repeatedly try to not comply, to be a peaceful human who does what you wish without following their rules, or without allowing yourself to be robbed by way of "taxation", government will always escalate.
If my choices are "comply or be caged", or "comply or be robbed", or "comply or be shot", then I am not freely making a choice, I am a slave to the one aiming the gun at my head.
I asked myself how it was not okay for me to go to my neighbor's house, with my own gun, and tell him "Give me your money so I can use it pay for my education", yet if I voted for some other humans to write scribbles on paper--which would then be enforced as law--it was okay for those enforcers to use threats backed by guns on my neighbor.
The Dark Truth
Nothing made the reality of "government" more clear than reading stories of good people who did nothing other than attempt to hang on to the fruits of their labor, having their homes invaded by armed men with weapons who arbitrarily stole things of theirs, went through their private things, and later threw them in a cage for months, in addition to still requiring them to pay up or face more caging.
Do you know what sets tribal warlords apart from politicians? Attire, and rhetoric.
Government is euphemised barbarism. Suits, scribbles on paper, rituals like voting, all of these things do not alter the fundamental reality of what the humans acting as 'government' will physically do to innocent people if they do not comply with their arbitrary demands.
Do NOT mistake a culture with luxuries or nice things for 'civilization'. Civilized people don't use deadly force against their fellow humans to make them live how they want.
Nice one. I do often find that many people will define the word "government" as something like "a system which organises a society", and so it's difficult for them to see the idea that government involves violence, or to see why a society which isn't based on violence would be desirable.
As an aside, I like how things are a little more literal in Spanish. "Impuestos" (impositions) is a common word for taxes in Mexico. Everyone knows that an imposition isn't voluntary, and when I tell someone that taxation is theft, it's thoroughly uncontroversial.
Perhaps that's why it seemed to me that among so many in Mexico, there was a general attitude of understanding that the government enforcers were something to just attempt to go around and avoid, but not something to respect, or worship.
I got a sense that they see them as what they are -- another irritant, another violent gang to be just barely tolerated, maybe appeased, but certainly not treated as a benevolent necessity.
Yes, that's pretty much the attitude. Except when it comes to voting time, then everybody gets the idea that things are gonna change.
The weird thing about it, which I still haven't figured out, is that, in a statist country, people are ready to argue with you about it, and after a while (perhaps months) of calmly answering their questions, they say "I guess you're right" or "I'll have to take this perspective into consideration in future discussions" or they become advocates in some sense. But in Mexico, when I explain my position, often people just say "Hm... that's interesting". It's a little puzzling - without a strong resistance, it's hard to know where to go.
Very eye opening article. I've slowly been getting more and more disillusioned with those in positions of authority, as I think many American have (and those in other countries as well). I often think about what "free country" really means, and the more and more I think about this principle the more I begin to think that "free country" is actually an oxymoron.
For example, let's look at the whole "National Anthem" business that is going on in the sports world right now. So they don't want to stand for the National Anthem? What's the problem? As a veteran who fought for this country, you would think that I would have the exact opposite feeling about it, but I don't. The reason is that the whole point of fighting for this country was to make sure that people had the right to decide not to stand for the National Anthem if they don't want to. I mean, it is supposed to be a "free country," isn't it?
If we start dragging people off the field and arresting them for not standing for the National Anthem, then we are no better than a dictatorship. Free country... I don't know anymore.
To be fair, government has been necessary for countless of years. To simply desire anarchy goes to show just how little you've analyzed the current world and previous ways of governance.
There is a beautiful idea of Anarchy in the cryptospace, where liberalism meets cryptography. Each man and woman to their own, governed by a blockchain as the ultimate Leviathan.
Anarchy in its entirety as 'absence of government' is dangerous to anyone involved. It's back to ancient tribal behaviour, which granted is still inside of us to some extent. Luckily that behaviour is countered by our desire to work in groups, to follow common laws, to establish rules with one another.
The people you see as 'evil' will still be 'evil' whether they're in government or not. It is because of this simple reason we need a common entity of laws that we all can agree to share.
Humans have a need to establish laws and rules. The same 'evil' people as before recognize this and take it upon themselves to work corruption with words and not with law.
By allowing the law and rulemaking to be high-jacked by just about anyone who dares to try, we'll see corruption. I'd much rather see a democratic voting system, built on a blockchain, with every person represented by their digital identity. Wouldn't that be sort of a cryptographic anarchistic society?
Is it safe? About as safe as true Anarchy, but because it's on the internet, everyone will be fast to correct mistakes.
It hasn't been until these modern times with the upcoming of globalization and the internet that we've started to be able to get together in large international communities, sharing culture, thoughts, ideas and beliefs. By these new modes of communicating with one another we're going to be able to build that Leviathan Hobbes talks about, not just an entity represented by the people, but an entity that which is the people.
Great article - my personal experience is that I awoke after spending thousands of hours 'testing' everything that I was ever told - I soon learned that 99% of what we have been told is total BS.
We are indoctrinated from the day that we are born and 99% of people go the grave without ever realising it.
We literally live in the Matrix - not physically jacked into a machine - but our minds most definitely are.
Keep up the great work - I suspect that you are one of the few that gets it.
Truth Fears No Investigation - Truth Will Out
Truth fears no investigation, indeed. One day, I remember distinctly being aware of my own fear of investigating something that threatened my world view. I told that fear to fuck off, because no way was I going to let myself be afraid of any truth, no matter how uncomfortable.
Stuff like that is why you get the big bucks!
Good Job!
Good post! You've touched on some points that have been dancing around my head from time to time, tho' my own thoughts are more academic/theoretic. Namely:
What if "government" were but a veil, covering up how we treat each other? What if we pull back the "veil of government" to see how us humans act on each other through the government?
If you're an eco grad, I'm sure you've seen the tie-in to classical economics' "monetary veil." Still, interpreting government in that way would reveal some (mostly unflattering, but some flattering) truths about we humans.
There was a recent study published in Nature which concluded that we humans are fairly violent to each other. The authors put the "baseline" percentage of us meeting a violent death at the hands of one or more human(s) at 2%. Loosely, that means a typical human - any generic human over the stretches of both history and pre-history - has about a 2% chance of being killed by aggression. That's sobering.
If you're interested, Live Science has a write-up on that paper: "Primates, Including Humans, Are the Most Violent Animals"
That paper has helped me see the other side of the anarchy question.
Precisely why hallucinating that there could be a LEGITIMATE gang, or a massive monopoly on deadly force that people accept, is such a historically and logically dangerous idea.
Let's give SOME of those flawed humans a massive monopoly on deadly force, THAT'LL work out well! Only wait, it hasn't! :)
Thanks for the reference, I'll check it out.
Glad to :) It doesn't say much that's flattering about we humans, but progress comes through disillusionment. :)
Gov't and the globalists want us to believe that we can't trust other - that's why we need Gov't right? Keeping us in fear is one of their major weapons. They want us to behave like obedient children and stay in line.
I've travelled to approximately 80 countries (and lived for 6 months or more in many of them). I have only feared for my safety on one occasion and that was when I thought that someone wanted to rape me but it never eventuated. My mind playing tricks on me.
There is nothing to fear except the globalists, gov't and the limitations that we place on our ourselves. Don't trust Nature Magazine, don't trust anyone. It's all a big fat lie. There are no Islamic terrorists to be scared of, your Gov't created them and pushed them down your TV screens - false flag hoaxes all of them.
I actually agreed with a lot of that. But that's from my own study of both actual reality and history. I do know that our fellow man (not the government) is not our enemy. My fellow man is only any "threat" in their supporting the very REAL violence-- the rulers that subjugate and harass me.
Amazing article and a very compact one with great meme support.
Always looking for some short texts or videos to show the "government" thing to people in order to reach them and plant a seed of insight.
Although it's tough to get through. Most people who never had a bad experience with gov still live the mother state "dream". They don't even dare to think that gov would act against them. It seems illogical to them, just as they've been told ever since. And yes: the truth does hurt!
But the good thing is that once the red pill really starts to sink in, there is no turning back. After chewing the (red) thing in free fall, you will settle again and find yourself empowered. Like a child who has just taken the BIG slide on it's own: experiencing self-confidence through self responsibility again.
You are love, have no fear!
I like extraordinary publication that has published a true connoisseur of political congratulations
Amen
brothersister, amazing article!Sister, actually. Amen SISTER. ;) That's okay, you didn't know! Thanks so much for the compliment.
Sister! Well: glad to make your acquaintance, ma'am. :)
Somewhere out there, there is a millennial who I triggered for not calling you broster. ;D
So many important points eloquently stated in this piece. Bravo and thank you Amanda👌
Couldn't have said it any better!
Great post! Funny too (cops beating flowers! Hahaha!). Resteemed!