Converting the Heathen to the One True Faith: Libertarianism; Women Are Welcome!

From: T
Sent: Thursday, November 30, 2017 11:03 AM
To: Walter Block
Subject: Defense and the minarchists

Walter: I have had incredible success helping high school students understand anarcho capitalism and it’s consistent application leads to a private law society. The same cannot be held for working with adults and trying to bring them to the consistent mindset of a private law society. The pushback I get is always on police or defense and especially the need that these adults see as in needing a state controlled military. I can get almost most adults to see that private police would be better, private courts would be better, and arbitration is the way to go. The welfare state is so easy to show its errors, student and adults alike seem to get to privatization quickly. The state created poverty as we know it. For my high school students, they have known War their entire lives and yet the vast majority have no idea the military is engaged anywhere in the world, they are so oblivious to what is happening, but after a short time they are often advocating an end to the warfare state. The warfare state has become so engrained in adults that they believe in the need to go “kill the terrrorists, and keep the (fill in the blank country) from invading the US by having a large military and thus need statism to support it. I have used the argument of the NAP and it’s not acceptable to kill innocent people. I have used legal arguments of a trial by jury of peers against those who violate private property rights and that does not seem to correct in their mind the need for a military, and the state to run it. I have tried Ron Paul’s argument that we have military bases in over 139 countries and blow back with no success. Of course I have argued against taxation to support the military leviathan. I have tried and tried but the minarchists who believes in the need for a strong military is basically a socialist and they don’t like that argumentation technique either. What do you suggest to help me be a better advocate for a private law society and promote peace? T

Dear T: I think you are doing better than many libertarians in promoting our philosophy. Hey, even Ayn Rand, Ron Paul, Murray Rothbard, Ludwig von Mises, Robert Nozick, Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman and other high profile libertarians have not succeeded in turning our society in that direction, although they have converted vast number of people to our cause. Why have all of us, together, failed? Why isn’t Ron Paul president right now, and we have an entirely free society? Surely, our cause is righteous, pragmatic just, and sensible. I think the explanation is sociobiology: the overwhelming number of people are hard wired to accept socialism and fascism. I try to explain this here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6b2HBJ5wLg

My bottom line advice to you, and others of us suffering from this malady: keep up the good work. Make only marginal changes. We are doing a pretty good job, as it is.

Here’s one possible marginal change. According to the Briggs-Myers Personality Type analysis, we libertarians — virtually all men — are mostly bunched up in one category, representative of a very small percentage of the overall population. If we continue on our present course, we thus confront a very low ceiling. There is even, I am given to understand, a mating – dating initiative based on this material, which indicates which groups of women, in which categories, are compatible with groups of men in our category. So, one possible practice might be to pitch our message to these other groups. If successful, and I have no idea as to the merits of this suggestion, this would at one fell swoop increase our gross numbers, and, also, bring more women into the libertarian movement, something that most present members would welcome with alacrity.

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1:41 pm on December 2, 2017