It was only a bit over a year ago that the most amazing thing happened to me, and it changed my life forever.
I've always been very conservative minded, not only in politics - but also in fiscal responsibility. I grew up in a household full of "work hard until you die", "you can't spend more than what you have" and "they're over there fighting for your freedom". I believed in these things wholeheartedly, and because of that, i did what i was 'supposed' to - i supported the republican party. The party of warmongers and conservative spending habits. It wasnt until 2003, when the Iraq war took hold, that i started questioning the motives of the Republican party.
Flash forward twelve years, to 2015. I'm angry - furious even. For the past 2 years I've watched as the Republican party - my party - sells out on nearly every principle that brought me to it, and worse yet, they're selling out in order to bend to the will of the left. I've had it, this party doesn't represent me any longer. Not even close.
So what do I do? Why, what any 30 year old would do when they're pissed off about something. I jumped on facebook, to proclaim my miseries to the world. Happy about what I've written, i decide to go for shock value. I finish my post with the words; " I'm starting to believe that anarchy is the only way".
I know, crazy right?
Just so you understand, anarchy to me was chaos. Anarchy was The Purge. I only knew what I saw in movies, and I was ok with it being portrayed that way, I mean, because shock value.
It was then that a long time friend of mine mysteriously appeared out of nowhere, throwing me a 'like', and a brief intro into Voluntaryism. A philosophy that says that every man or woman is an individual, and should be looked at as such.
At it's core, voluntaryism is the idea that no person has the authority to control another person's life, and that all interaction should be voluntary - completely void of outside intervention. We do not believe in utilizing the state to create a desired result. In fact, we see the state for what it is - an institution that uses coercive force to motivate it's subjects into compliance. Using the principles of non-aggression as a set of guidelines, voluntaryists see the world in a completely different light.
Do as you will, yet harm none in the process.
At the heart of all of this, and the similarities can be seen throughout, is the free market. Voluntaryists believe that the market should work just as our everyday lives should work, autonomously - completely void of regulatory interference and currency manipulation. This has always been my view, so it was just a happy coincidence that it was a staple of voluntaryism as well.
This new world spoke to me. It WAS me. The people that hold this philosophy dear are everyone. They are you and I. They look at you as an individual, and make judgements accordingly. Voluntaryism challenged me to look past the collective stereotypes, and see people for who they really are. This philosophy opened up a door for me, in which every person on the other side was a potential friend. I saw things in myself that i had never knew previously existed. I saw peace - i saw love - and i found hope.
Awesome wayne :)
Thanks dave!
It's so weird, I'm 45 and been ranting on facebook for quite a while. I only found out about Steemit a couple of days ago (we can be quite backward in small town South Africa)! Apparently I may be an....Anarchist???!!! I kind of associated the term with 1970's punk era. I'm not completely sure I want to be defined into a category. But I am interested! Thanks for your post.
How do i 'like' your message, or 'vote' for it?
Haha, it's like the blind leading the blind. You touch that little circle wirh the arrow inside.
I am fascinated. I have been banging away at facebook for years, knowing I'm different from my friends. I only joined steemit on Friday, and I've already been exposed to so many ideas, which can take my thinking further. What I do know is that society as it is now is going to "collapse" in some form. I also believe that we as humans, welk some of us at least, know a better way.
Thanks man! Im on facebook under Wayne Mitchell if you ever wanted to look me up. Im apart of a large community of voluntaryists on there, so maybe you can feel like you have some people whom share your values and ideals. Best wishes.
Thank you for the interest! If you are truly interested in voluntaryism, it is synonymous with libertarianism. The Libertarian party is the platform that introduced the idea into the theatre of the state, but in reality, it was never meant to be intertwined. I really appreciate the feedback! Im only just using steem, and am not sure how it works just yet, but message me anytime!
Not true my friend. Libertarians are one of two things.
They're Statists who think they believe in a limited state and voluntaryism, in which case they're fooling themselves because there can be no such thing. As soon as you give a political body power, it will seize that opportunity to increase its power, and will increasingly abuse its power at the expense of your individual liberty.
Or they're anarchists who haven't yet put two and two together and realized that it's an all or nothing game. You can't be a Statist and an anarchist. They're mutually exclusive. And if you're truly an anarchist, it would be a violation of your principles to participate in the affairs of the State.
I wouldn't participate in the affairs of the state, i dropped that religion a while ago.
It probably would have been clearer to say that voluntaryism is synonymous with libertarianism - absent the influence of the state. Almost all principles/codes of conduct and property rights/rules transfer directly between each other. Hope that clears it up.
Welcome to the other side!
I've been a self-proclaimed anarchist for around 5 years or so. Before that I considered myself a Libertarian. Before that a conservative. And before that, I was just too young to know anything about how the world really works, but I did a stint as what I would categorize today as a Marxist communist.
What still amazes me is that when I explain the philosophy of what you call voluntaryism and what I call anarcho-capitalism, to a statist, how often they agree with everything I'm saying, right up until we get to a topic that they don't agree with me on.
For example, drug use. A "conservative" statist will agree with me that I am a sovereign individual, and that nobody has a right to take my property. But as soon as I say that I'm in favor of eliminating laws restricting all types of narcotics manufacture, distribution, and use, they start to tell me that drugs are a danger to society and that they need to be regulated.
What I've determined is that all statists are basically just statists.. It doesn't matter if they're liberals (excuse me, progressives) or conservatives. They're still statists. And they fundamentally believe that they have authority over me -- even if they tell me they are protecting my freedom.
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Interesting
I will follow you to see your future posts! +vote
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