Andrey Yefimitch, the hero of Anton Chekhov’s Ward Number Six, says: "I serve in a pernicious institution and receive a salary from people whom I am deceiving. I am not honest, but then, I of myself am nothing, I am only part of an inevitable social evil: all local officials are pernicious and receive their salary for doing nothing. . . . And so for my dishonesty it is not I who am to blame, but the times.... If I had been born two hundred years later I should have been different. . ."
Libertarians who still work at tax-funded positions tend to argue their involvement with the state in a similar way. There are lots of variants of the explanation but it typically finishes with something like this: "I work for a pernicious institution and rob the taxpayers – but at least I know that it’s evil and dishonest. I don’t hide it. In the long run this state system is unable to function. It will collapse. It is wrong both morally and economically. But look, man, right now I need the money. And, what’s more, I tell other people straight in the eye that we don’t need the government". The libertarian scholar who works for a state institution can go even further: "I teach my students the evils of taxation and state regulations. I work for the government but I’m the enemy within. And, hey, these weirdos even pay me for it".
There is something fundamentally wrong with this. Imagine a worker at a private company telling someone: "I hate my company. Our products are faulty. My boss is a dunce. But, well, this dunce pays me two grand a week".
The state acts so absurdly and inefficiently that it really pays the man who fervently attacks it. That is very comfortable – but doesn’t seem to be moral.
What do government-funded libertarian scholars count on? That all people will follow their advice, cut their connections with the state, eventually make it disappear and only then – at the very end – those professors living off people’s money will follow suit?
If not – what other options are there left to overthrow the government? What solutions do we have at our disposal?
Suppose we decide against being engaged in military-like conflicts, shedding blood or seizing the government and trying to impose freedom using its powers (if such a thing was possible). How can we make a free society happen?
Libertarianism implies the absence of the state. It means no state institutions. That means no people willing to work for the government.
Resign your tax-funded position if you hold one. We are one step closer to making a free society reality.
Start changing the world with changing yourself. So simple yet so difficult.
Libertarians who still work at tax-funded positions tend to argue their involvement with the state in a similar way. There are lots of variants of the explanation but it typically finishes with something like this: "I work for a pernicious institution and rob the taxpayers – but at least I know that it’s evil and dishonest. I don’t hide it. In the long run this state system is unable to function. It will collapse. It is wrong both morally and economically. But look, man, right now I need the money. And, what’s more, I tell other people straight in the eye that we don’t need the government". The libertarian scholar who works for a state institution can go even further: "I teach my students the evils of taxation and state regulations. I work for the government but I’m the enemy within. And, hey, these weirdos even pay me for it".
There is something fundamentally wrong with this. Imagine a worker at a private company telling someone: "I hate my company. Our products are faulty. My boss is a dunce. But, well, this dunce pays me two grand a week".
The state acts so absurdly and inefficiently that it really pays the man who fervently attacks it. That is very comfortable – but doesn’t seem to be moral.
What do government-funded libertarian scholars count on? That all people will follow their advice, cut their connections with the state, eventually make it disappear and only then – at the very end – those professors living off people’s money will follow suit?
If not – what other options are there left to overthrow the government? What solutions do we have at our disposal?
Suppose we decide against being engaged in military-like conflicts, shedding blood or seizing the government and trying to impose freedom using its powers (if such a thing was possible). How can we make a free society happen?
Libertarianism implies the absence of the state. It means no state institutions. That means no people willing to work for the government.
Resign your tax-funded position if you hold one. We are one step closer to making a free society reality.
Start changing the world with changing yourself. So simple yet so difficult.
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