Statism is radical, dude.

Give up your freedoms, so you can be free.

A common misconception (when presented to the Statist-oriented mind) about the Anarchist or Voluntaryist philosophy is that it is extremely “radical.” This assumption destroys any hope for logical discourse as it essentially “turns off” the receptors. With no consideration for the information presented, the idea is simply dismissed entirely. To help alleviate this I’d like to demonstrate that Statism itself is a radical concept with an almost schizophrenic ideology.

For the “Common Good”

Statism claims to be in place as a measure of altruism and a manifestation of the “common good,” while simultaneously attempting to achieve these goals with violence. It presupposes that a monopolistic institution that uses coercion is the only way altruism can exist, because apparently without force, altruistic motives are destroyed by greed and corruption. So then, we need a coercive institution, that determines price and other regulations, to force its social services on others. The government is essentially telling us that in order to do good, they must do evil (good = evil). This is the same as saying that in order to make things hot you must stick them in your freezer (hot = cold).

Statism tells us that all people are corrupt and violent, and that the only way to keep people in line is to make them fear the punishment of the state. The message here is that two people who bump into each other on the bus, stop themselves from drawing knives and killing each other only because they fear retribution by the state. If this is true, we have to apply this basic principle to the state, its advocates, and administrators, not just the ruled population. They are people too, after all. But if only "fear of retribution" keeps violence and misanthropic behavior in check, by the Statist's own admission, the state and its rulers are kept in check by nothing as they are accountable to no one.

For Your Protection

Statism operates on the premise that the only way to protect the people from violence and coercion is to give a monopoly over the use and initiation of force, violence, and coercion to a small group of people. The state then uses their monopoly of force to perpetrate violence on the populace itself, while claiming to protect that same populace from violence. So even though Statism is responsible for over 200 million deaths just last century, we are being thoroughly protected.

Consider your rights protected. 

The protection of property rights is also important. But Statism claims that the only method to protect property rights is to support a coercive institution whose representatives give themselves the right to expropriate the population's private property for any services they see fit to use it for. This also includes extortion through taxation, and the promise of future extortion by using the young and unborn as collateral on foreign loans. In essence, we need to be stolen from in order to protect ourselves from being stolen from.

In addition to violence and property rights, the State offers protection through coercion in the enforcement of social contracts. This makes its appearance most noticeably in the free market, where Statism claims that it needs to impose regulations on companies. These companies, run by people investing their own resources and whose risk of failure rests solely on their shoulders, need to be regulated by a monopolistic institution that produces nothing of its own, answers to no one, and always places the responsibility of its failures on the tax payers.

The Omniscience of Statism

Politicians and Presidents alike are viewed in an almost deific spotlight. We put all our faith into the ruling class, expecting them to know what is best for everyone. We attribute a status to our leaders that makes them appear almost like moral beacons. We believe that they possess more knowledge, more wisdom, and better judgment than the entire population it rules over. These (imagined) attributes somehow allow them to make more qualified decisions than we can concerning our health, well being, finances, and code of ethics. However, at the same time, the 'dumb masses' are given responsibility over picking the individual whom knows better than they. If we are supposedly flawed to such a degree as to not know what is best for us, how on earth are we supposed to elect a good leader?

Statist checks and balances.

Statism claims that in the absence of statism (that is, in the absence of a central, monopolistic, violent system of enforcement) we would all be lead down a road of endless conflicts and that cooperation would be impossible. But the state, that has no monopolistic institution it answers to, is apparently exempt from this and manages to cooperate with each of its branches without endless conflict.

This kind of omniscience that the state seems to possess bleeds into its judicial system too, where supposed checks and balances are to keep the system free from abuse of power. Once again we are asked to believe that despite claims that only violence/coercion prevents self-interested behavior, the state can be trusted not to use the system it owns, the judicial system, to its favor.

Seriously, it’s Science: Don’t Question it

Experts agree.

One of the most remarkable things about arguing for the abolishment of Statism are the defenses of the institution. They almost always revolve around Statism itself as being the justification for its existence. For example: “Government is the natural state of society because it’s how it has been for five thousand years.” Essentially, the claim is that existence of Statism is the proof of its inherit advantages. This is akin to saying, “Slavery is just how we’ve always done it, therefore it works!”

So, the above premises are all clearly rational, and empirically verifiable, because Statism defenders all over the world will tell you so. Any argument to the contrary is well beyond the realm of rational discourse, right? That's how propaganda works, you'd have to be insane to argue against it. However, if you find even one of the above premises ridiculous, is that not reason enough to evaluate what you believe you know about the state?

The truth is, as I have indicated above, Statism is radical. Some of the premises it operates on are completely flawed, such as "We need to give up our freedoms so we can be free." But this is the way it is, so it must be there for a reason, right? With the very foundations of Statism resting on such clearly shaky claims, the onus is on the defenders of Statism to prove that their philosophy is not based on a completely broken rationality.


-JD Smith