This can be a difficult principle to apply for many. Many of us adopt violent behaviors as we grow up. Sometimes violence is directed towards others as can see in various kinds of abuse. Sometimes violence is pointed inwards and we can be very violent with our self. Either harming ourself through destructive patterns of eating, health, cutting, smoking, drugs, or alcohol, and it's often accompanied by self verbal abuse or negative self talk: I'm useless, I'm stupid, I'm such an asshole, no one loves me, etc.
The application of this principle requires the abandonment of certain ideas that have been ingrained within many of us since childhood.
Ideas like:
The Non-Agression Principle is not a specific list of rules or directions.
It serves as a moral compass to help guide us to the destination of peace and liberty via personal responsibility and individual freedom.
For some, it may be a shock to hear that The State is actually often in direct conflict of this Non-Aggression Principle due to the ideas listed above.
Violence, war, coercion, and involuntary taxation are all direct violations of the Non-Aggression Principle, yet we are raised to believe these things are right, just, and necessary. We're even indoctrinated to accept these things from the age of 5 as we go through public education. In many ways the public education system is a weapon of mass destruction teaching young people about their nation's exceptionalism or creating victims out of certain groups of people looking revenge for damage caused.
The goal is to teach peace as an alternative to violence and coercion. And it starts with a fundamental understanding of NAP.
