-Caveat Lector- Kris Millegan wrote: > > from: > http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.16/pageone.html > <A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.16/pageone.html">Laissez Faire City Times - >Volume 3 Issue 16</A> > ----- > The Laissez Faire City Times > April 19, 1999 - Volume 3, Issue 16 > Editor & Chief: Emile Zola > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Government is a Quack Faith-Healer > > by Wolf DeVoon > > Humans exist in perfect freedom. Obedience is a choice. > Government is therefore an illusion. <snip> from: <http://www.buildfreedom.com/tl/tl07b.htm> THE NATURE OF GOVERNMENT by Frederick Mann Introduction I've often asked, "If freedom is so good, and so many great minds have praised and promoted it, then why is freedom in danger of being wiped out?" One of my answers to this question is that "government" is the main enemy of freedom, but nobody I know of has come even close to accurately describing "government" and communicating such an accurate description widely. For about seventeen years I've been working on developing an accurate description of "government" that could be communicated widely. My work in this respect is still very much in the experimental stage. Every reader of this article is invited to provide me with comments and suggestions to improve our description of "government" and its communication. This article is aimed mainly at people who already know a great deal about freedom - people who realize that in order to bring about general human well-being, peace, happiness, health, prosperity, etc., we need to find a solution to the scourge of "government." However, it's possible that people relatively new to freedom will grasp its main thrust without too much difficulty. The "nature of government" is a very important issue. I believe that achieving an accurate, communicable description of the nature of "government" will bring about a major turning point in history. The fact that nobody (I know of) has come even close to this achievement indicates that it's a very very major challenge. As a preparation for studying this report, I highly recommend the excellent article 'Lies Our Forefathers Told Us' by Victor Milan. Mr. Milan identifies some very important basic aspects of "government." I also suggest you study the "Government Traps" section of '#FFP05: Harry Browne's Freedom Principles'. These materials will most likely help you to better understand what follows. A Classic Description of the State "There are still peoples and herds somewhere, but not with us, my brothers: here there are states. The state? What is that? Well then! Now open your ears, for now I shall speak to you of the death of peoples. The state is the coldest of all cold monsters. Coldly it lies, too; and this lie creeps from its mouth; 'I, the state, am the people.' It is a lie! It was creators who created peoples and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served life. It is destroyers who set snares for many and call it the state: they hang a sword and a hundred desires over them. Where a people still exists, there the people do not understand the state and hate it as the evil eye and sin against custom and law. I offer you this sign: every people speaks its own language of good and evil: its neighbor does not understand this language. It invented this language for itself in custom and law. But the state lies in all languages of good and evil; and whatever it says, it lies - and whatever it has, it has stolen. Everything about it is false; it bites with stolen teeth. Even its belly is false. Confusion of the language of good and evil; I offer you this sign of the state. Truly, this sign indicates the will to death! Truly, it beckons to the preachers of death! Many too many are born: the state was invented for the superfluous! Just see how it lures them, the many-too-many! How it devours them, and chews them, and re-chews them! ... It would like to range heroes and honorable men about it, this new idol! It likes to sun itself in the sunshine of good consciences - this cold monster! It will give you everything if you worship it, this new idol: thus it buys for itself the luster of your virtues and the glance of your proud eyes. It wants to use you to lure the many-too-many. Yes, a cunning device of Hell has here been devised, a horse of death jingling with the trappings of divine honors! Yes, a death for many has here been devised that glorifies itself as life: truly a heart-felt service to all preachers of death! I call it the state where everyone, good and bad, is a poison-drinker: the state where everyone, good and bad, loses himself: the state where universal slow suicide is called - life." This is how Friedrich Nietzsche described "the state" in his classic Thus Spoke Zarathustra, in 1884. Typically, in the history classes taught in the last generation in "government schools" in America, when Nietzsche is discussed, he is depicted as the forefather of Hitler's Nazi ideology. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nietzsche was probably the most penetrative philosopher and psychologist there has ever been. He saw right through the falsehoods on which "government" rests. Fifty years before Hitler came to power he was already disgusted at what he saw happening in Germany. He predicted that Germany would suffer a horrible calamity. He was so disgusted that he renounced his German roots and became a Swiss citizen. The Nazis did take some of Nietzsche's statements out of context and used them as slogans. But to teach that Nietzsche inspired the Nazis is pure brainwashing. Nietzsche clearly saw what a destructive disaster "the German state" was and expressed his view in unequivocal terms. Maybe that's why "government monopoly schoolteachers" try so hard to discredit him. Nietzsche's is a pretty good description, but I doubt that it's communicable to but a few. Although Nietzsche did make it to the front page of Time magazine with his pronouncement "God is dead," he never got anywhere with "the state is dead." Nevertheless, he did indicate that "everything the state says is a lie" and "everything it has it has stolen." He did indicate that "the state" is an idol and an instrument of death. He also pointed out the "confusion of the language of good and evil." Description of "Government" First, I'm going to provide my comprehensive primary description (or definition, if you like) of "government." Then I'll elaborate further on aspects of this description. I'll also cover some secondary descriptions of "government." It'll also be necessary to explain certain thinking skills that are necessary to grasp the descriptions. Finally, a few important related topics and arguments will be briefly covered, as well as the benefits of understanding and applying the information in this article. Primary Description of "Government" "Government" is a granfalloon, a scam, a hoax, a fraud, a swindle, a theatrical tragicomedy, and a form of parasitism or cannibalism kept in place by certain fraud-words, by superstition, by idolatry, by gullibility, by lack of thinking skills, by brainwashing, by mass hallucination, by terror, and by violence. "Government" is a "Granfalloon." Author Kurt Vonnegut coined the word "granfalloon" to describe abstract concepts like "nation," "state," "country," "government," "society," "IBM," etc. He wrote, "To discover the substance of a granfalloon, just prick a hole in a toy balloon." In his book The Incredible Secret Money Machine, Don Lancaster explains: "A granfalloon is any large bureaucratic figment of people's imagination. For instance, there's really no such thing as the Feds or the General Veeblefeltzer Corporation. There are a bunch of people out there that relate to each other, and there's some structures, and some paper. In fact, there's lots and lots of paper. The people sit in the structures and pass paper back and forth to each other and charge you to do so. All these people, structures, and paper are real. But nowhere can you point to the larger concept of "government" or "corporation" and say, "There it is, kiddies!" The monolithic, big "they" is all in your mind." [emphasis added] A granfalloon is the lumping together of many diverse elements into an abstract collection, and to then think and speak as if the abstract collection is one single entity capable of performing actions . This phenomenon leads people to say things like "the government runs the country." I hope you realize (or will soon) just how absurd the previous sentence is! "Government" Consists of Individual Human Beings. The human brain is an abstracting device. We might call the first level of abstraction the "concrete abstract." Consider the concept "table." The concept or word corresponds to and represents a physical object "table." However, the concept "table" is more general than the object "table" - because the concept "table" can be applied to any of a large number of objects with flat surfaces and (usually) four legs; whereas the physical object "table" is one specific object. Our next level of abstraction we might call the "collective abstract" - for example, "furniture." It's very useful to lump together a number of diverse but related objects and use the abstract word or concept "furniture" to represent all of them. It makes thinking and communicating more efficient. Instead of saying, "Clean the chairs, the tables, the shelves, the mirrors, the cupboards, etc.," you can simply say, "Clean the furniture." It's much more efficient. But with the increase in efficiency comes a potential lack of distinction... "Government" can be described as a collection of individuals, pieces of paper, buildings, weaponry, etc. Let's take a look at what becomes possible when we think in terms of individual human beings, instead of the monolithic collective abstract "government" - a two-sentence refutation of all the arguments for "government": "Government" consists of individual human beings - or people. When people say "government is necessary to do X (whatever)," or "only government can do X," or "government must do for people what they can't do for themselves" - what they're really saying is: "people are necessary to do X," or "only people can do X," or "people must do for people what they can't do for themselves." Compare this to all the books containing lengthy chapters on why "the free market" is better at providing X (whatever) than "the government" is. Once you develop the ability to think in terms of individual human beings, it takes just two sentences to demolish all the arguments for "government." This is a demonstration of the comparative power of individualistic thinking as opposed to collectivist thinking. Unfortunately, for most people - including many freedom lovers - it seems impossible to grasp the above refutation because they are locked into the habit of thinking, talking, and writing about "government" as a volitional entity. They say "government does this and that" - as if "government" is some kind of living, breathing entity capable of performing actions - collectivist thinking. Sometimes it seems that when you say to these people, "Look at anything that "government" supposedly does, like running a school, and you'll find that all the work is being done by individual human beings," - individualist thinking - they can't hear you. They seem so brainwashed with the notion that "government does things," that their brains automatically shut out anything to the contrary. We are dealing with a particular mental process here: when the mind is confronted with a thought that is dangerous to the way its knowledge has been organized hitherto, it tends to either "wipe out" the thought, or distort it into something more acceptable - as George Orwell wrote in Nineteen-Eighty-Four: "Crimestop means the faculty of stopping short, as though by instinct, at the threshold of any dangerous thought... crimestop, in short, means protective stupidity." "Government" is a Scam, a Hoax, a Fraud, and a Swindle Nietzsche wrote that everything the state says is a lie. Of course, it's really individuals who lie when they call themselves "the state" or "the government." Throughout history, people have used all kinds of trickery to legitimize calling themselves "the King" or "the government" - for example, "the divine right of Kings to rule" and in "modern" days, "the Constitution." Some of this trickery is described in Terra Libra Report #TL06: Discourse on Voluntary Servitude. The issue of the validity or legality of the so-called "Constitution" is covered in Report #TL07: The Constitution of No Authority. The essence of that report is that the so-called "Constitution" was never signed or adopted by anybody to make it a valid legal contract or agreement. That means that the so-called "U.S.A." has been a scam, hoax, fraud, and swindle from the outset. It also means that all the politicians and bureaucrats, calling themselves "presidents," "secretaries," "judges," "generals," "congressmen," etc., have been liars and impostors masquerading as "government" (so-called). The people who signed the pretended "U.S. Constitution," called themselves "We The People... " They were lying. They signed it as individuals. And they never signed it in any way to make it a binding contract. It's a basic legal principle that for a contract to be valid, it needs to be knowingly, intentionally, and explicitly signed by all the parties involved. For something like a "U.S. Constitution" to be valid, it would have to be knowingly, intentionally, and explicitly signed by every single person involved. On the same grounds, every political system in the world, I know of, is a fraud and a hoax. In his pamphlet, No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority, attorney (one of the good ones) Lysander Spooner wrote in 1870: "The constitution has no inherent authority or obligation. It has no authority or obligation at all, unless as a contract between man and man. And it does not so much as even purport to be a contract between persons now existing. It purports at most, to be only a contract between persons living eighty years ago... we know, historically, that only a small portion of the people then existing were consulted on the subject, or asked, or permitted to express either their consent or dissent in any formal manner. Those people, if any, who did give their consent formally, are all dead now... and the constitution, so far as it was their contract, died with them. They had no natural power or right to make it obligatory upon their children... they did not even attempt to bind them. That is to say, the instrument does not purport to be an agreement between anybody but "the people" then existing; nor does it... assert any right, power, or disposition, on their part, to bind anybody but themselves... The constitution itself, then, being of no authority, on what authority does our government practically rest? On what ground can those who pretend to administer it, claim the right to seize men's property, to restrain them in their natural liberty of action, industry and trade, and to kill all those who deny their authority to dispose of men's properties, liberties and lives at their pleasure or discretion?" Reading Spooner's pamphlet was an assault on my whole knowledge structure. It triggered a process of questioning many concepts such as "constitution" (so-called) - what does this word represent in reality? If Spooner was right, then it represented but an empty fraud. It also meant that words did not necessarily correspond with reality. There were "fraud-words" which served only to mislead. And if there is no valid "constitution," then what does the word "country" mean? What does it really represent? Similar questions followed about ''government," "state," "king," "law," etc. In the Introduction by James J. Martin to Spooner's No Treason, I read: "Since late Neolithic times, men in their political capacity, have lived almost exclusively by myths [more appropriate: "fraudulent fabrications "or "murderous misrepresentations!"] And these political myths have continued to evolve, proliferate, and grow more complex and intricate, even though there has been a steady replacement of one by another over the centuries. A series of entirely theoretical constructs, sometimes mystical, usually deductive and speculative, they seek to explain the status and relationships in the community... It is the assault upon the abstract and verbal underpinnings of this institution which draws blood, so to speak... those who attack the rationale of the game... are its most formidable adversaries." [emphasis added] Spooner attacked words and phrases like "the government," "our country," "the United States," "member of congress," "King," "constitution of the United States," "nations", "the people," "emperor," "divine right," "president," "monarch," "ambassador," "national debt," "senator," "judge," etc. He indicated that these were all fraud-words designed to dupe the gullible. In a letter to Thomas F. Bayard, Spooner wrote: "In practice, the constitution has been an utter fraud from the beginning. Professing to have been 'ordained and established' by we, the people of the United States, it has never been submitted to them, as individuals, for their voluntary acceptance... very few of them have ever read, or even seen it; or ever will read or see it. Of its legal meaning (if it can be said to have any) they really know nothing; and never did. Nor ever will know anything." Spooner indicated that the people who masqueraded as the so-called "government" could be more accurately described as fraudulent impostors or a "secret band of thieves, robbers and murderers." Rick Maybury wrote as follows in an article, "Profiting from the Constitutional Convention," published in the November, 1984 issue of an investment newsletter, World Market Perspective: "On March 10, 1783, at the town of Newburgh, New York, a group of generals met to plan a military coup. The generals offered the leadership to an officer the troops had respected and admired for many years... for several days the officer pondered whether or not he would accept the offer to become military dictator of America... finally, on March 15, 1783, he announced his decision to decline. His name was George Washington... ... the First Constitutional Convention which commenced on May 14, 1787 had George Washington presiding. This is the convention that created our current constitution. The procedures and results of this convention have long been held to be legal, ethical, constitutional, patriotic and in every other way proper... it was held in secret. It had a hidden agenda. It was surrounded by clandestine meetings in which numerous deals were struck. The delegates intended to draw vast amounts of new power into the hands of the federal government and they violated every restriction their legislatures tried to impose on them. The First Constitutional Convention was actually a military coup. The history books do not describe it this way, but that is what it was... It may have been the slickest, smoothest, most well-lubricated coup any nation has ever experienced. To this day, most Americans do not understand what was really done to them. They look back on it all and smile wistfully." "Government" is a Theatrical Tragicomedy My Webster's defines tragicomedy as "a drama or a situation blending tragic and comic elements." The theme that "government" is theater is expounded by Ferdinand Mount's excellent book The Theater of Politics - in the Introduction Max Lerner writes, "politics is shot through with the theatric, and can be understood best only if we view the exchange between political actor and political audience as theater... the element of theater on the American scene has gone beyond politics and pervaded the entire society. It has become history-as-theater." Let me suggest that when you watch TV, listen to the radio, or read the newspaper and the topic is politics, either people are getting hurt or killed (tragedy), or some political actor is openly joking or pretending to be serious (comedy). Alexis de Tocqueville in his Recollections wrote about the 1848 French Revolution: "The whole time I had the feeling that we had staged a play about the French Revolution... Though I foresaw the terrible end to the piece well enough, I could not take the actors very seriously; the whole thing seemed a vile tragedy played by a provincial troupe." Some quotes from Mount's The Theater of Politics follow: "... [T]he political confidence trick, whether monarchic or presidential, oligarchic or democratic, whether necessary or unnecessary, is at any rate effective, because most people are foolish and gullible." "Is political history the record of a mass of mugs being taken for a series of rides?" "We see the politician rather as an actor who takes on a part; and we judge him according to whether he plays well or badly." "The theory is comforting: they are our hired servants. The practice is humiliating; we are their wayward wards, to be comforted, cajoled, bullied, but never to be treated as equals, never to be told more of the truth than suits their present purposes, and too often to be told off-white lies." "He [Churchill] is, as all political actors must be, the analyst of humbug, the humbugger and the humbugged all in one." >From Edmund Burke's Reflections on the French Revolution, describing political rhetoric: "... a theatrical, bombastick, windy phraseology of heroick virtue, blended and mingled up with a worse dissoluteness, and joined to a murderous and savage ferocity, forms the tone and idiom of their language and their manners... Statesmen, like your present rulers, exist by everything which is spurious, fictitious, and false; by everything which takes the man from his house, and sets him in a stage, which makes him up an artificial creature, with painted theatrick sentiments, fit to be seen by the glare of candle-light, and formed to be contemplated at a due distance... If the system of institution recommended by the assembly is false and theatrick it is because their system of government is of the same character." Words Have Consequences Of course, words in themselves don't have consequences, but whenever a word is used, there are consequences. When you talk to a person, depending on the words you use, that person may become happy, sad, or angry. Words have consequences. If words have consequences, then it's obvious that different words have different consequences. It's also obvious that we can observe the consequences of the words we use. We can become aware of the consequences. We can experiment and learn to use different words to produce different consequences. Also note that when the politicians and bureaucrats want your money, they don't immediately point their guns at you. They send you words on paper or by phone. In general, they only come after you with their guns if you repeatedly don't give them money. Because most people obey the words of politicians and bureaucrats, they don't have to use their guns all that often. In Terra Libra we talk a lot about Freedom Technology: the practical knowledge, methods, and skills to live free. A major aspect of Freedom Technology is to learn how to use the right words to counter the words of the politicians and bureaucrats, and to escape having to give them money - without being jailed or shot. Let me suggest to you that the destructive power of the politician, the bureaucrat, and the lawyer stems much more from their words than from their guns... Take away their words, and what happens? How can we take away their words? Self-Referencing Syntax In order to grasp the nature of "government" (so-called), it may be necessary to master certain thinking skills that enable you to handle self-referencing syntax. English - and probably languages in general - isn't particularly suited for handling self-referencing. Consider the sentence: "government" consists of individual human beings. The reason the word "government" is in quotation marks may indicate that the author questions the validity of the term. To emphasize the challenge to the validity of the term or concept "government," the author may say: so-called "government." When I say - So-called "government" consists of individual human beings - the sentence includes self-referencing syntax. The sentence says that part of itself is invalid - the concept of "government." There is also a problem with the use of "quotation marks." They are used for at least a dozen different purposes. The reader has to figure out from the context for what purpose quotation marks are being used. In his book How To Read A Page, I.A. Richard wrote: "We all recognize - more or less unsystematically - that quotation marks serve varied purposes: Sometimes they show merely that we are quoting and where our quotation begins and ends. Sometimes they imply that the words within them are in some way open to question and are only to be taken in some special sense with reference to some special definition. Sometimes they suggest further that what is quoted is nonsense or that there is really no such thing as the thing they profess to name. Sometimes they suggest that the words are improperly used. The quotation marks are equivalent to 'the so-called.' Sometimes they only indicate that we are talking of the words as distinguished from their meanings... There are many other uses... " Questioning Words or Concepts Most people take it for granted that there is some kind of one-to-one relationship between words and the things represented by those words. They assume that because practically everybody uses a word like "government," therefore there's such a thing as "government." In order to develop an accurate description of the "nature of government," it's absolutely vital to make a distinction between the word and the thing it supposedly represents. The word is a noise that comes out of your mouth (or some squiggles on paper). The thing is something you can touch or feel - or discern otherwise. This is why semanticists are fond of saying, "Whatever you say something is, it's not that." You see, the thing is what it is - and what you say it is, is a noise coming out your mouth. Just because we use the word "government" doesn't automatically mean there's a thing "government." For the previous sentence to make any sense to you, you must be able to question words or concepts. You must be able to recognize that "government" is an abstract concept. In contrast, "table" could be called a "concrete concept" - even though the concept "table" is an abstraction of the thing "table." There's a word in my Webster's for construing (regarding) a conceptual entity as a real existent: hypostatization. I speculate that for most people their consciousness is rooted in a number of basic concepts, and that "government" is one of these basic concepts. When their "government" concept is challenged it's as if their entire consciousness is threatened and they run a mile. Later I'll refer to "statist fraud words." Some years ago I had dinner with a libertarian intellectual friend in the Atomium Restaurant in Brussels. We had an extensive discussion about libertarianism. Every time he used a statist fraud word such as "government," "country," "nation," "prime minister," "law," etc., I challenged that word. I asked him what he meant by it. I asked him for a referent. (The referent is the thing the word refers to. In the case of "table," it's the physical object with a flat top and four legs.) After about 20 minutes of my onslaught, my friend became sick and had to run to the restroom to puke his guts out! He blamed me. I speculate that challenging people's basic concepts may threaten, not only their consciousness, but also their metabolism! -[cont]- Not copyrighted; public domain. Please copy, translate, publish, and distribute widely. Please include following reference: Originally published by TERRA LIBRA in October, 1994. DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
