It seems to me that the innumerable license mandates, regulatory bodies, registration requirements, and government agencies surrounding us are accepted not because of any concrete evidence that they help society, but simply because our parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents thought they were good ideas. Such things persist through bureaucratic inertia, not because they withstood the test of time.
Good ideas do not require coercion, and can survive skeptical examination. Take a moment today to question something done by government. Ask yourself whether it really needs to be done at all, and if it does need to be done, question the benefit of monopoly provision through the State. Is mandating participation and compliance truly justified? Why is it acceptable to extort your neighbor to fund something you believe necessary?
The ongoing election drama this year should have raised the question already. Why does so much seems to hinge on who is in charge of the system? If the system has so much power that the selection of politicians threatens about half of the population every election cycle, maybe the system needs to be dismantled. Politics turns every dispute into a zero-sum game, so it is no wonder that animosity grows as power is concentrated in politics.
As that animosity grows, the desire for justice, real or imagined, also grows. In 2020, we saw protests and riots over police abuse spiralling into arguments about social justice, systemic abuse, and demands for change without any grounding in the philosophy of liberty. The real revolution is not in the streets, it is between your ears. Practice fighting that fight first. Build a foundation so you know what you are fighting for and what you are fighting against. With any luck, we may achieve change without any need to fight at all, but if a fight does come, you want to know you're on the right side. If you think either Trump or Biden is an ally, it's time to think again.
