On Liberty

From ‘Be An Atom!’, a collection of essays and aphorisms in the works. This, here, is a free chapter.

Liberty

It was the first chapters of John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty which, on their own, confirmed and labelled in my mind the true struggle: that for liberty.  Ever since, my philosophical struggles have been towards nothing but an ever increasing liberty- until this current state, where utter liberty is- in my mind- the only just, moral, and ethical course society should take.

What is the opposite of liberty? It is authority- and what is the result of authority? Slavery, ill-education, conditioned submission, the war of each man against the other: for each will compete to being more slavish or dumber than the other, for it is the case that tyrannical masters despise clever servants.

And what has risen out of liberty? I am not to claim that one thing can be totally positive, but it is the case that in all things we should choose the principle that promotes happiness above-all: and to me, liberty is a principle firmly grounded in these facts.  For what, politically and economically, is the result of liberty? Participation, co-operation, competition: for liberty essentially, in its base, entails the preservation of the liberty of others, in order to leave ones’ own liberty intact- authority, however, has the opposite effect: it destroys others in order to preserve the power at the core.

What is the message of the long twentieth-century? It is, in my mind, that authority- in the form of the boss, the politician, the religious leader, and political firebrands- is the agent of death, and of destruction: just as, when coupled with industrialism, it is the mass-producer of misery.

By ‘mass-producer of misery’, I call images of the sweatshop workers assembling the developed world’s shoes, clothes, and all at a price cheap enough for the multi-nationals or local slaver-businessmen who exploit it to take home a profit large enough to deter government interests from helping these poor people.  In this case, government is equated with corruption and failure: although it is the same case in every country, it is here utterly opaque.  It is even the case that trade unions- if they can even function- capture the workers in frenzies which drive them to uneconomical schemes, only furthering their misery.  A man should trust himself first and thereafter (through his tools and faculties of empathy) his brothers and sisters.  For if he does not trust his individuality, he immediately delegates decisions and experiences to outer groups, who can only roughly and imperfectly represent him- this, to me, is the crux of all collectivism: that by undermining the individual’s ego, the collection of individuals loses all meaning, and might as well be shepherded.

Government and authority is the Shepherd.  Didn’t Jesus of Nazareth always use this image? However, the sheep do not need the shepherd.  They evolved independently, and only have been made dumb by the protection and domestication of the shepherd himself, living only for the benefit of him.  However, government is not as benevolent as the shepherd: we, due to the institution of permanent tax (which has evolved from an occasional institution to a permanent regulated part of our lives) and regulatory regimes are permanently put through the meat grinders: we never have our days in the sun in the fields, as the sheep do in times before markets.

The institution of authority is, in my mind, equivalent to a grain of sand lodged in the eye: it causes great soreness, pain, discomfort, and blinding, yet, it has convinced many that it is there for a good reason: because it stops another grain of sand from being lodged in the same place.  The permanent posture of authority is simply- ‘you are not clever enough, you do not have enough time, you do not have the experience, you do not have the ability to rule yourself, therefore we must do it for you’: when more often than not, they are the least perfect men of society, who are not equipped in the slightest to legislate or inform us of what shall make us happiest.

The heydays of liberty are eras of peace- the heydays of authority are war, where due to the mass involvement, the institution of authority- whatever be its form, institutional or some rebel jackboot- is overwhelmingly useful in prosecuting the killing of the most enemies, just as it is in peacetime too, but in times of peace the enemies of the masters are the servants themselves.

What is the basis of authority? It seems to me, after much reading and thought, to be ‘virtue’, ‘morality’: and not a virtue based on sensitive, individual things, but based on things like policy, collective (a synonym to me of ‘insensitive’) values, and ultimately submission.  What then is the proper immorality of liberty?

The proper amorality of liberty, in my mind, is based on an irregular thing: happiness, that the pursuit of happiness is the ultimate goal of all.  There are things which connect with happiness: knowledge, wisdom, love, empathy, and all these are encouraged by freedom: for whilst yes the freedom to harm may be encouraged (although I believe that in a society which despises invaders above all things, that this would be immediately discouraged and reduced) by freedom of action, freedom of retaliation too equalises it, so that ultimately the norm would be of peace, that this ‘war of all against all’ as Hobbes predicted would, most likely, be a stalemate, or a victory for the peaceful- law would be voluntary rather than a code of death, and those not taking it would be judged on their own terms.  For what, if there is freedom, is the basis of society? It is interaction: and that interaction is best oiled by love, empathy, closeness, consensus, and law, for if a law (and that is to me a principle) is just and promotes happiness, then the greatest majority will promote and support it, same for an unjust law, which is too often actually supported by the state, that collection of special interests.  Liberty, in its very function, celebrates difference, and takes power from it as an equalising force: authority wishes to make all uniform, industrial, at its core: for authority requires a simple fact, compliance, and requires nothing else.  National uniforms, absolute conscription, and the abolishment of freedom of thought: all are the brainchildren of authority taken to its slickest end.  The man, who may be considered an outlaw under authoritarianism, may be considered a hero or model citizen under the rule of liberty, of anarchism- the state of no leaders.  England has a strong tradition of this: Robin Hood, Hereward the Wake, and more recently the guerrilla artist ‘Banksy’, all struggled- or do struggle- because of their conscience.  I want it ultimately to be the case that Liberty- what I would ultimately call ‘Freedom from invasion’- is every man’s pistol, and that their Conscience is their Sovereign, and maximum happiness be his aim.

Why does liberty encourage wisdom and why does wisdom encourage happiness?

What is wisdom? Wisdom is the abundance of experience and knowledge, a confidence born out of monumental power.  And what do structures of authority do? They necessarily release information, and control information, by what grades or levels- with the leader knowing the most, and the lowest knowing the least.  However, this information is often a matter of training, or a matter of the undemocratic direction of the company of people the hierarchy runs.  Therefore, in order to become wise in a hierarchy, one must rise to the top, or to somehow punch above one’s weight, so to speak, and to circumvent the hierarchy, and become the confidant of those above.  Take away the hierarchy, and make information free, then wisdom is automatically easier to accumulate, just as freedom of speech creates the richest canvas of opinion in order to discuss with, so too does freedom of information: in this way, liberty encourages experience, and in the same way as ‘Nothing can come of nothing’, in the words of King Lear, by the same principle ‘Anything can come of everything’ too.

Law is the ultimate friend of liberty.  For what is liberty, this opposite of government? It is participation: it is responsibility, and what is the measure of responsibility? The Law; what is the opposite of responsibility? Representation: Government, involuntary measures.

The source of authority in a free society, is the clique, and with this, privilege.  And privilege is something to be kicked-in and smashed when it runs past the right to consume the products one makes or buys, and extends to preventing others from doing the same.  Not that under liberty secrets would be somehow illegal; they would simply be discouraged by the very mechanisms of free information and distribution: one would have to be a fox to recognise traps, and a lion to frighten off wolves, to quote Machiavelli.  Liberty is, to me, the essential of being an atom: chaotic, indestructible, and free.

Why is government in absolute opposition to liberty? What of a government which protects it against enemies?

Liberty is the security of rights.  Why is government in opposition? Consider any right: the existence of a right also entails, by its very existence, the privilege to reject the right: I may refuse my right to a wage, and be a volunteer; I may refuse a right to a payment, and gift a product if I wish; however, the right to rule is considered under current, involuntary, representative government to be invincible: what else is this, but tyranny? A government which does this, does not protect its people from enemies, it makes enemies of its own people.