One good thing that came out of the pandemic was a general awakening to the fact that governments have a tendency to come up with arbitrary rules and laws, based on nothing but gut feels and irrational calls from scared individuals. It doesn't matter if something is stupid. What matters to government is that whatever they do is popular in the moment when it is proposed. When popularity vanes a rule can always be revoked or forgotten, and things can go on as if nothing bad ever happened.
Here in Porto, my family and I were at one point apprehended by the police for going to the beach for some fresh air. It was a very serious offence and no laughing matter, according to the thug that lectured us on good citizenry. We were also forbidden from sitting down inside for a bite to eat. That was strictly for the vaccinated. Our local supermarket announced to its clients that it would soon be open only to the vaccinated. Without a valid health passport, no food could be bought at the place.
Then, suddenly all was forgotten. Something was happening in the east of Ukraine, and that distraction was all it took to drop the whole vaccine passport thing. A year later, it's as if it never happened. However, many people will never forget what happened. Especially young kids who've been left bewildered and in need of some answers.
Luckily for my son, he has a father with answers to why all of this happened, so he doesn't have to wonder how things can get so completely out of hand. He also knows what the solution to this would be, and he knows how to behave in a world where the solution is not yet implemented.
Arbitrary government edicts were at the root of all the crazy things that were going on. There was nothing scientific about any of it. It was pure tyranny. The solution we used to protect ourselves was simply to resist as much as possible, and my son has seen that this approach worked. None of us went along with the medical experiment that they pushed on people. This led to some inconveniences for a few weeks, but the reward is now clear. We don't have to worry about long term side-effects.
The real solution to the kind of craziness that government tends to hoist on its subjects from time to time is to get rid of it. We don't need government to make decisions for us. We can take care of this ourselves. Everything that the government does can either be stopped altogether or done through voluntary arrangements instead. Anarchy is the logical alternative to government, and there's no reason to believe that it wouldn't work. In fact, government needs some level of magic thinking in order to defend its existence. We have to believe in fairy tales about some social contract that magically subject us to the whims of madmen in government.
Anarchy requires no such magic thinking. It's based on natural laws that anyone can relate to. If something happens in my house, I'm the one to resolve the issue. If something happens between two domains, it's either resolved through voluntary arbitration or not resolved at all. It's never the job of a third party to force itself upon us. We don't have to bake a cake if we don't want to.
Anarchy worked well for the Irish up until the English invasion in the 1600s. Ireland was a well functioning and peaceful society. The same can be said for Iceland until the Danes took over in the 1200s. These places are still well functioning, but that doesn't take away from the fact that they functioned well without government, and that government added nothing that wasn't already there.
Somalia, which is often held up as a nightmare due to anarchy was in fact a well functioning society up until it became colonized. It was government that turned Somalia into a hell hole. The chaos that ensued was due to the failures of government, and the continued chaos in that area is due to the persistent insistence by the UN to install a government in the region at any cost. The last thing they want to see is a prosperous anarchy returning on the world stage. But Somalia is in fact doing better than its neighbours in terms of economic growth despite the UN's efforts to destroy its free market economy.
A quick look in any history book reveals that every major disaster has been due to government whims and edicts. Wars, mass starvation, genocide, persecutions, economic stagnation. The list is long. Nothing even close to this kind of chaos has been caused by anarchy, and the history of pre-government Ireland, Somalia and other historic anarchies proves that such places don't do any of the horrible things that government is known to do at a regular basis.
Yet, the word anarchy is commonly used as a synonym for chaos, and this causes some confusion, especially among those who know that it's precisely the other way around.
It's weird to see reporters calling violent anti-government protesters anarchists, because the anti-government protesters aren't in fact anti-government. They're only anti-current-government. What they want is a different government, more to their liking. Anarchists don't want a government at all, and they don't show up at protests for the simple reason that they don't think the government has any legitimacy.
Anarchists don't protest loudly in the streets. Anarchist creates instead anarchies of their own. These are little enclaves of independence, usually confined to a home and associated properties. Investment decisions are based on the pragmatics of the situation. Government is at best seen as an unreliable source of subsidies, and even then it's viewed as an enemy.
My eleven year old son understands all of this. I haven't lectured him. I've only pointed out the absurdity of having overlords ruling over us. Especially when these overlords are as dense as wood blocks and with no moral fibre.
This has in turn emboldened my son to point out this fact to some of his friends, and the response has been positive. Given the choice between a system where overlords rule over us and a system where we simply get together and resolve issues as we go along, kids prefer the idea that they themselves are in charge of their destiny.
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| The social contract |
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