Sweet! Make that three influenced by Bioshock. 
Thanks a lot to everybody that’s contributed thus far! I’ve enjoyed reading the responses thus far and I look forward to reading more.
What’s striking to me, thus far, is this:
(1) Many people have been successfully converted from socialism to libertarianism.
(2) Conversion to libertarianism in most cases takes quite some time.
In regards to (1), I credit Howard Zinn (socialist) for playing a very important role in my transition. His work destroyed my faith in the state, which is critical. For this reason, I’ve often thought that socialists may be easier to persuade than we typically imagine. After all, they already reject the “official line” and accept “radical” reformations of society. Instead of consciously avoiding socialists, it may be advantageous to repetitively engage them politely and directly, emphasizing the facts and questioning the apparent contradictions in their ideology.
Also, it’s clearly unlikely that anybody will swallow the entire philosophy whole. Perhaps its wise to gauge each person’s situation individually and encourage them along the path by offering only what they are willing to digest at a given time. Ron Paul, for example, appears to play a major role for many. Even though many of us desire more than simply “following the Constitution”, perhaps turning somebody on to Ron Paul is all they need in order to pursue the rest entirely on their own. In some cases, it may be temporarily counterproductive to reveal the entire case for Rothbardian anarchocapitalism if people aren’t prepared to accept it.
What I’ve been doing recently is engaging as many people as possible only when they reveal a hint of being receptive to small doses of libertarianism. I figure that for every minor point that I persuade somebody, it brings them marginally closer to libertarianism. But if I lose them entirely by scaring them off with full-fledged anarchocapitalism, then they might instead embrace their current ideology even stronger, out of fear. Not to mention the fact that many people appear contented with minarchism. While I disagree, minarchism is clearly better than unrestricted … archism?
That is all you need to know. My guess, is that most people start searching for themselves. Those are the only ones that will learn.
My short story. I graduated from college with a B.A. in history, and considered myself a conservative Democrat. I got married. My wife and I got a 350z. I found my350z.com. They had a politics forum. At that point, I was convinced we needed regulations, and more of them. I asked if anyone else on the forum felt the same. Surprisingly to me, it was a resounding no. I had a lengthy discussion with them about it, and they helped me realize that businesses are not evil, because the consumer is king. I talked to them about more political stuff, eventually found out about libertarianism. I found CATO and FEE. Eventually I found Mises.org. Mises and FEE made more sense than CATO. Mises.org created a forum shortly before I found it and I joined. Through conversations on here and through other studying, I finally realized that state is illegitimate. It took about four and a half years of in depth study and thought.
The point is, I asked the questions. I went searching for answers. Those that are not interested in answers, will never give up their faith in the state.
Minarchism is a pipe dream. People that refuse to let go of it, will never see anything really change. for the better.
Fair enough. But many minarchists may be paused there as one stop on their long journey toward anarchism. And in that sense, they should be politely encouraged to complete the journey. 
On the flip side, a minarchist is still better than most and may still participate in educating others to make the move toward libertarianism.
After all, if we eventually reach a point where minarchists are considered the extreme left political wing, we’d likely have a pretty free society on our hands.
-Michael
I think we were socialists before we knew anything about economics, at leat that’s how it was for me, lol. As you said, your views were influenced by Friedman and Sowell…well as soon as I started learning economics I started getting rid of my socialist tendencies and I didn’t learn about Friedman or Sowell untill like 2 years ago, lol.
I thnk the important thing is that we’re open to logic and evidence. Of course, the morality of libertarianism is important as well, IMO. However, it’s enough to become morality because it works so well. All morality has some sort of pragmatic basis to it. Property rights allow us to settle conflicts peacefully(I’m not a pacificist however, like if someone attacks you then i think you can and should defend yourself since the attacker is infringing on your right of self-ownership)
[:)]
As a child of the 1980s, I identified straight away with the likes of Reagan and Thatcher (okay, they weren’t strictly libertarian, but at the time…). The free-market and limited government ideology always made much more sense to me – even as British National Curriculum (the standards/knowledge base all schools are obliged to teach) trumpeted the glories of FDR, socialism, ‘Uncle Joe’ (Stalin), the ‘evil’ of the Victorians etc.
I remember being about the only one in my history class who questioned the ridiculous worship of FDR…
Anyhow, after finishing secondary school (high school), I came across Ayn Rand. Atlas Shrugged seemed like the greatest book I’d ever read, largely because of its unapologetic defence of capitalism and the individual. Then from there, I discovered the Mises Institute and began to agree more and more with the philosophy of anarcho-capitalism.
So here I am, today.
As for ‘Bioshock’, I read that the game creator intended it to be a criticism of Objectivism, and that people were meant to be appalled by Andrew Ryan?
I was a conservative throughout most of my teenage years, and always thought leftism was pretty silly. When I say “conservative” I mean it in the ‘Wayne Allyn Root’ sense of the term (not part of the religious right, but somewhat of a liberventionist). One day I took some random political quiz which ranked me as a libertarian–a term I had never even heard before. I did some more research on what libertarians believe, and found that I agreed with them on most things.
I was still a little skeptical of libertarian views on foreign policy (and to a lesser degree, immigration), thinking that libertarians made some interesting points but were kind of naive. “Maybe the non-intervention stuff could work after we kill al Qeada” was basically my mindset. This was before I stumblied on to Harry Browne’s site and became addicted to his columns and radio show. He gave me all the answers on foreign policy I was hoping for. Eventually, I found Lew Rockwell’s site (thanks to Browne, who linked to LRC continuously) and the Mises Institute. What converted me to anarcho-capitalism, however, was Strike the Root. Anthony Gregory, Mike Wasdin and other STR columnists eventually won me over. Jeremy Sapienza and the crew at anti-state.com helped as well.
In the end, it was not any grand polemic but a series of short, to-the-point articles that brought me over.
After reading this, I went back and found the article where the game creator (Ken Levine) explains the connection with Objectivism. It’s an interesting read, but I’ve copied some of the more interesting pieces below:
He’s taking non-extremism to the extreme. [:P]
On a serious note, though. I dont’ think it’s easy to get mired in ideology at all. I think most people are pragmatic and only later find an ideology simply cus they like it…and if anything, most folks don’t think in terms of ideology in my opinion…at least not the ones I know. Most folks I know simply wanna be able to do what they please without someone interfering with that. However, i have often heard that it was “Rand’s way or the highway” so to speak when it came to discussing things with objectivists. I personally wouldn’t know cus I don’t know any objectivists, lol.
I did spend about 10-20 minutes setting my post out and then when i posted it the server crashed. How annoying. I’ll try and post it tomorrow or sometime soon .I written my story before It just needs some corrections.
This place.
pivotal point in my life at this point was my beginning awareness of politics and the horrors of war. The twin towers had collapsed and now there was a ’ war’ against Afghanistan.The falling of the twin towers in a way representented the changing of my whole world view and also my life. the era of ignorance was over. It was time to put away childish things. innocence was lost-before this point I was a fairly carefree kid, unaware & indifferent to politics.I remember for some reason being strongly in favour of invading Afghanistan and Iraq when it all happened. I knew very little and bought everything the media said.I thought Iraq/Afghanistan was an evil & terrorist and should be destroyed . I hated Saddam and all Iraqi’s.I’m so ashamed of how sheepish I was at this point.
Individualist (2002)
My sheepishness in this areas was contrasted with my individualism in general. As I was growing became acutely aware of how different I was from everyone else. I took extreme pride in this ,seeing anything of a compromise as losing myself completely. Though I didn’t know the word yet- i used sheep instead - I was vehemently opposed to Collectivism.these thoughts only began to increase in intensity as I grew older. I was unique and fiercely so.This belief in Independence, free thought and resistance to unthinking conformity continues to this very day.
Anti-Nazi
In 2003 I was made more political as i came to understand the hideous acts committed by Hitler and the Nazi’s .I made a choice then that whatever i believed i would always be against the Nazi’s in any form and would fight to avoid there rise to power.From my Foundling understandings of history I decided I was Very Much In favour of freedom,I was opposed to oppression and tyranny Yet i never thought over this much.it was a background thought in my head.
Pro war
2004, I took religious studies class at high school . Not so much because I had an interest in religion though i did but because I liked the philosophical elements to it which at this point remained untapped in me.Even At That point ,I yearned for philosophy.We covered such topics as abortion,War,euthanasia,death,birth,poverty etc.I think it was this pondering of topics that made me become more politically minded.It was at this time I became pro -choice on the issue of abortion and I supported the right to die .
I remember shockingly that even after hearing all this horrendous history of war and the current events and reading arguments against war ,I still wasn’t swayed. I believed in vegetius “if you desire for peace, prepare for war”. I believed the Liberal lie that if you want peace in the world you must kill people to achieve it.I continued to support the interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan .Now that seems so horrible and abhorrent to me ,I don’t know what I was thinking.It just makes no sense at all and yet it seemed right to me at the time.
I remember it was also in R.s. class that we were asked what we believed would be the right punishment for certain crimes , weird but all the way back then i believed something akin to the libertarian theory of punishment espoused by Stephan Kinsella,I explained that i believed in like for like and thought it was just that rapists etc be castrated and killers killed.
Confused Classical and social Liberal
It was also this year that i read a book with a brief simplistic section on politics. It seemed to describe what i believed in:- free speech,free assembly,free association etc It called this liberalism (i never really understood this was classical liberalism which the book declined to mention)it said this begun with john Locke(whereas now i know the tradition goes back much further). It was from reading this that i decided this philosophy was right for me.I fell in love with these ideas, they fit perfectly with my love of Freedom. My parents where always talking about rights -especially my mum and this was what i believed in too.
Unfortunately as i see now, the family i grew up in was ‘left liberal’ thus i also took on this idea.The book i had read failed to distinguish between social liberal & classical liberal.I confusingly believed in positive and negative rights, a belief i now understand is impossible.I wrote a list of what i considered to be human rights and on this I included ‘right to health care’ and ‘right to education’.During this time I was very nearly a socialist( I didn’t exactly understand what socialism or other political beliefs were thankfully ) ,In fact my parents branded me "left Wing".Not knowing fully what this meant I accepted it as it seemed to be where my allegiances lay.Even though I carried this label I continued to be relatively Apolitical.
Pro Scottish Independence.
The only really political part of me was my unwavering support for Scottish independence
Unknowingly Objectivist.
Around Late 2004/ early 2005 on typing individualism into a google search engine i was directed to Individualist Voice, a website focusing on the individualism of objectivism. I never knew of Objectivism at the time but from this website i was being an Objectivist.This website made me more radically individualist it also made me think more about my beliefs. (It was probably this that sparked my philosophical mind to start with)
slowly but surely thanks to this website I was cured of my previous socialist type leanings. Though not deep I was able to criticise socialism as a virulent brand of collectivism( I continue to be socialist’s enemy .I never fail to criticise it wherever I see it and who ever it comes from. Again I appeal to my invention 'Scott’s law’ :- people are most critical of the beliefs they once held so dearly) .It wouldn’t be till later i would have a thorough libertarian critique of socialism -its philosophy,politics and economics.Despite being unknowingly Objectivist I still clung to mysticism(spiritualism) ,it wasn’t till later I gave this up.I still had no idea what Objectivism was or who Ayn rand was..
Objectivist /Naturalist.
It was in 2006 that i discovered the website i read was objectivist and began to look into objectivism.Objectivism strengthened my belief in rights- I now believed in natural rights .
Ignorant SNP Supporter/ Critical Of Iraq ‘War’.
I grew more political mainly from watching the news and debates on TV which led me to become more critical of the invasion of Iraq .Sometime around this point I became opposed to capital Punishment.I somehow discovered the SNP (Scottish national party). I Liked their drive for Scottish independence, other than this I didn’t know much about them.I thought they were pretty rubbish other than this policy but I didn’t care ,All i wanted was Scottish independence. I later realised this willingness to sacrifice principles to goals was a grave error.
from the beginning of 2007 to its end I absorbed all of objectivism. I became strongly Objectivist following the idea of peikoff and others. I read all I could get my hands on about it.
I saw ‘animal rights’ for the joke it was, I laughed at (statist) environmentalism, I was an egoist ,I hated socialism ,I opposed the criminalization of drugs -all the tenets of rand’s philosophy.In many ways I’m glad I came to these positions ,I just wish it had of been from the Austrians instead of rand alas it was not to be . Unwittingly by way of rand I had accepted Libertarianism in a watered down way- I didn’t even know what Libertarianism was then and I wasn’t really political at all .During this period I also learned about philosophy and consumed it voraciously . I began to weave this into my defences of objectivism.As an objectivist I saw half if not 99% of the world as evil .This resulted in a warped misanthropy inside of me.It really wasn’t healthy.
My position on the Iraq ‘war’ changed yet again ,Now i joined the randroid war lovers.I was opposed to how Iraq was conducted but i believed it was just.I believed Syria and others should have been the true targets. I became a rabid nationalist who felt the west represented by the . U.S.A. was under attack by Islamic collectivist forces.Absurd i know,now.These days I oppose with all the fire in my blood such pro war lunacy and am staunchly Anti-war.
Pro SNP Yet Critical.SNP Elected. Pro Scottish Independence Still.
2007 was also a year of what i felt was important change .SNP was elected, I cheered strongly. I felt independence was within grasp- such vain beliefs in retrospect.it may never happen definately not if politicians have their way.SNP are content to free Acotland only to bind it up to EU rule.Thankfully my support of the SNP was not to last long.
not long before christmas 2007 searching the internet I was to make a discovery that would change my life forever.I discovered a libertarian called Ron Paul.At first when I read about him it said he was a conservative and I was wary but i was somewhat resistant to him though i was a strange objectivist in that i was willing to work with and accept libertarianism.
he had many things about him an Objectivist could like and the more and more I read about him the more I agreed…
2008. The Year Of My Libertarian Awakening
Reading about Ron Paul made me highly political.I listened to his speeches and read all his writings.I begun to know what fiat money was,was the gold standard was and about all sorts of other issues. in 2008 i didn’t read so much objectivist literature- I was moving away from it . Inspired by Ron Paul and discovering more about Libertarianism I looked into it.I read Milton Friedman(bypassing a chicago type phase luckily) ,Ron Paul, ,found the Mises instute and read the writings of the Cato institute etc( I found them to mild for me even then and I was only starting out as a minarchist!).I read all i could get my hands on.-It was Ron Paul who taught me the difference between capitalism and corporatism- I began to take very strong stances on alot of issues.
In all this reading i pretty much gave up Objectivism. Libertarianism was much deeper,more philosophical,more thorough,short on rhetoric and invective and long on thought and theory.Everything Objectivism wasn’t.I still accepted and accept some parts of objectivism but in a more rational way because (1) they ARE valid and (2)because they are concepts which pre-date rand e.g. natural rights.
Minarchist Libertarian/Supporter of Ron Paul/Big ‘L’ Libertarian
Around the time the recession hit (or at least I became aware of it) through Ron Paul I looked into the causes of the recession .I looked up what a recession was and then listened carefully to what he said was the cause of it . I began linking all the things he said in my mind into a unified whole.
Though i only grasped the basics I understood Government working with central banks printing money caused it.I began to think deeply over everything and apply libertarian principles to all sorts of things encouraged in this by Ron Paul and the things i read. I took on a constitutionalist Minarchist non Interventionist Libertarian Position.I was a big ‘L’ libertarian.I joined the Libertarian party of the U.K. (LPUK) and would’ve voted for them if they were on the ballot at that time too. I was beginning to engage with various members of that party and was trying to form a Scottish wing.Libertarians in Scotland were and still are bare on the ground.we’re a minority in a country awash with ‘positive rights’ ,socialist leanings, egalitarianism and pessimism. It was tough going.
Anti-SNP.
I followed all of Ron Paul’s campaign.As My Libertarianism grew i realized the SNP was socialist(I hadn’t know this previously) as well as a Sham .I stopped Supporting them.As always in my life i now became one of their few critics even among libertarian circles.
I- Feminist.
Among my readings i discovered Wendy Mcelroy .Due to her influence I became An individualist Feminist.I also discovered Voluntaryism…
2009. I Hate The State. Becoming Anarcho-capitalist.
Anarcho-capitalism
by early 2009 I was wondering how to extend my ideas for a Scottish libertarian party… well that was until i began reading more voluntaryist /Anarcho-Capitalist writings and more literature from Lew Rockwell .com and the mises institute…
A podcast by Lew Rockwell on anarchism made me decide political parties can’t achieve anything.I wasn’t quite an anarchist yet. I was just an extremely radical minarchist.my form of minarchism was essentially just managers running the army,the courts and the police.it was a pipedream i know but its what i believed in.I allowed my LPUK membership to lapse.
One day after reading Anarcho-capitalist writings i struggled with the fear. what if there was no state? God ,I couldn’t not believe in that.I had believed in that my whole life.It seemed so radical.How could I be so Wrong…But then I had been badly wrong before…
it felt so new interesting ,cool,exciting ,Honest but yet deeply terrifying.I was scared about what this would mean for me and the future as well as scared about how society would survive this way.I wouldn’t let myself believe it. I resisted.I compromised in my head " Anarcho-capitalism might work but minarchism was good enough and it was just."How wrong I could be!
It became my new obsession .I read over and over articles and papers about anarchist courts,law,police and other topics. I grasped the basics of it all .It sounded plausable.
Out of the blue a couple of days later I found myself scribbling like a maniac on books and pages the Anarchist ’ A’.why am i doing this?
“i accept anarchism”.my mind finally clicked and accepted it.
Anarchism would work ,anything less couldn’t and was unjust.
When i was asked about these symbols i replied proudly “I’m an anarchist.an Anarcho-capitalist”. At this point I didn’t fully grasp all the ins and out’s if anarcho-capitalism.I wasn’t too strong on anarchist law or courts or I.P. for example.As time goes on I grasp more and more of these areas.An important area is law it was this issue that worried me when I received some criticism which made me doubt if it could work at all.I feared then I would be stuck . Anti -state Libertarian and yet without a libertarian system of law.Happily my fears were answered and my doubts erased with a good dose of logic and of course… Rothbard.
Small ‘l’ Libertarian
With this i became a small ‘L’ libertarian.My support for Ron Paul was gone- I still think he’s done great work in attracting people to our movement and spreading our message but as an anarchist I have to disagree wit him . I became Skeptical and critical of LPUK- I mean they were minarchist and fairly unradical at that, more chicagoean rather than austrian. later I went back and looked at their manifesto.For all its rhetoric it was statist still and very tax loving it barely even was Libertarian. How could I have once belonged to this!
I absorbed more anarcho-capitalist information and philosophy.
From Hans Hermann Hoppe I developed a much more deep seated hatred of Democracy.I saw Monarchy as more perferable.I had never liked democracy since my randian days ,Hoppe just made this stronger.
From stephan Kinsella I accepted Libertarian Punishment Theory And refuted my previous opposition to capital punishment.I also agree with his view that voluntary slave contracts are impossible.
From walter block I understood and accepted the austrian form of Free Market Environmentalism.I still disagree with his evictionism and beliefs about stem cells and negative homesteading.
From Rothbard I believe in a stronger form of natural rights and also natural law. Im stronger in my belief in metaphysical and epistemological realism.
I’ve deepened in all my philosophical position ,finding the austrian school extremely philosophical.
I’ve become a huge critic of ‘left libertarians’ who i ardently dispise.
my knowledge of austrian economics is much deeper and i continue to learn about it. I find lectures on my I-Pod to be extremely helpful in broadening my understanding.I have lots of Pdf’s to read through Sadly I don’t always have the time especially for a 200 + book. I now grasp the basic’s of austrian economics mostly due to a book called the free market reader which although simplistic is a perfect introduction for a beginner which I embarassingly admit I am.There are people who know so much more than me ,I makes me feel so ignorant and humbled.
Bioshock is anti-rand, and anti-free-market, however. Don’t recommend it. Warren Spector was the intelligent one while System Shock was being produced, and he left to do better games, such as Thief III and Deus Ex II.
Anyway, I’m Russian. That should explain why I’m not a Socialist (there are idiots, however, in Russia, who’ve learned absolutely nothing). I am very well read in history. Authors such as Kuznetov or Rybakov, in novels, and nonfiction such as Suvorov, or Solonin.
Edwin Cannan is someone I read, and a great economist.
Hoppe’s and Block’s writings, and Mises’ writing have improved my economic knowledge much further, the first being give. De Soto wrote a monumental book I read, and liked. I like Bastiat and, especially, Gossen. In fact, Gossen, mentions marginal quantities, and knows his partial derivative approach has limitations. He also offers a business cycle theory in agreement with Mises.
I was a philosophy major in college and considered myself a socialist, even an environmentalist. I had gained this worldview from the philosophy curriculum and a career in music.
I began to have doubts in an ethical theory class, when we discussed Rawls. I didn’t like the outcome of Rawls’s contracted society. It didn’t seem to make sense. I began to question the very idea of equality–how can we all be equal anyway? We’re all different.
I’m lucky enough to be attending a college with a free-market economics department, namely Western Kentucky University. I took an econ course to fill a gen ed requirement, and that’s where the change began.
My professor actually argued that minimum wages cause unemployment! I was shocked. I’d never imagined that what the state does to “help” actually has the opposite effect. I had, after all, been taught in my philosophy classes that the State is the end all, be all, capable of solving every problem.
I read Freakonomics and was fascinated with the idea of unintended consequences–that’s exactly what a minimum wage is, after all.
I took to economics like a fish to water. I loved it. I switched my major. But I kept my petit-socialist tinge. After all, even a free-market economics class goes over the so-called “market failures” which plague capitalism. I guess I was one of those people who thought socialism is a “great theory” that may not work in practice.
All of that changed when I read a book called “Markets Don’t Fail!” by Brian Simpson. I went to the university library intending to settle the debate between capitalism and socialism in my mind once and for all. I checked out 2 books written by socialists, and 2 books written by capitalists. The Simpson book happened to be one of the two capitalist books. This book changed my life. My big problem with embracing capitalism was my (mistaken) assumption that externalities and the like, market failures, are an unsolvable problem. Simpson’s book proved to me that these failures are a fiction, and they are generally caused by the state!
Now I began with new eyes to look at the world around me. Now I knew 1) that the State’s policies sometimes had unintended consequences, and 2) the State likes to blame its failures on the market.
Like clockwork, here came the Great Recession. I saw both of these things writ large, every day, in every news story. I watched the economy collapse, realized it was the fault of the state (Thomas Sowell has written about the gov’t housing policies of the 80’s and 90’s that led to this collapse, it’s good reading) and watched the state blame the market. And people believed it!
I found George Reisman through the footnotes in Simpson, and ordered his book. I read it intently, and started following his online writings. I read his blog from start to finish, saw him predict the collapse before it happened. I found this website through his blog, I think, he was crossposting here. And that was the beginning of my evolution.
I’m most impressed with Rothbard. I find his libertarianism makes the libertarianism taught in my philosophy classes (Nozick’s) look like a strawman.
I also ordered “economics in one lesson” from this website, and it’s so good I tried to get my mom to read it! (she’s not interested)
Anyway, now I’m a senior, and I’m going on to grad school in economics next fall. I plan to get my PhD and teach. I want to spread the gospel, and try to get America back to where it started, at least–a minimal government is worse than none but it’s better than what we’ve got now. I think the only reason we have semi-socialism in America is because there’s so little understanding of economics. I want to change that, one student at a time.
Most Influential Reads:
Markets Don’t Fail! Brian Simpson
Capitalism George Reisman
Atlas Shrugged Ayn Rand
Economics in One Lesson Henry Hazlitt
Anatomy of the State Murray Rothbard
This Website.
awesome! I just bookmarked the page on amazon for Markets Don’t Fail! so that I can order it later.
Was similar for me. I had a little bit of a libertarian for an economics teacher in high school (even though he adhered to Keynesian economics, he still acknolwedged that government policies based on this often failed). He also showed us some vids from 20/20 with John Stossel. However, at the time I considered myself a moderate conservative because i was fiscally conservative but didn’t really care much about social issues, even if I disagreed with them. I think this basically stemmed from me just naturally not liking arbitrary authority. Eventually I came across Ron Paul, read some of his work and the same of Milton Friedman(well haven’t read his works other than “Capitalism and Freedom” which i thought was great except on what he thinks caused the Great Depression…but i do have some other books of his which i plan on reading). I read stuff on this site as well and came across the vids/audio, which had a huge impact on me, especially Walter Block.
I grew up in Apartheid South Africa so I’ve always healthily detested government. Then I lived and worked (and had most of my paychecks stolen from me) in England. They abolished the taxes on gambling so I took that up as my major profession. Now I’m in the US and the similarities to the national socialist militarist regime I knew in South Africa are uncanny to me.
Whenever I hear someone say that people in America are “free” I cringe…
As far as becoming a libertarian is concerned, having lived under the extreme left and extreme right I always thought of myself as a centrist. Eventually I realized government could only ever be, at best, a benign malfunctioning parasite and, at worst, the ultimate purveyor of anti-liberty and serfdom. This pretty much happened once I was out living and working for myself so I came to the conclusion that anarcho-capitalism is the only system which offers true liberty to the individual.
Now I found Mises.org and I’m slowly reading and discovering all the economic reasons that, hopefully, can back up my conclusion
I was a neo-con. Not knowing anything about politics. My dad mainly was into politics. Naturally, we were “republicans” and I guess supported McCain. But, my parents started to listen to Bob Barr, and that introduced slightly the concept of libertarianism. They were going to vote for him, but ended up voting for McCain instead. I was mixed and didn’t know if I wanted to be a conservative or a libertarian. And for a while, found my self asking me, why do you support this and that (banning gay marriage/iraq war).
I found a clip of Ron Paul. That sealed the deal. I started to watch Ron all the time now. Became a libertarian over night. I found Milton Friedman (was disapointed to know he wasn’t an Austrian economist) and he put out the message of freedom in a fantastic way. Of course, then found a few documentaries on the Mises media youtube channel. That sealed the deal that I was a minarchist.
I must say now, looking back, political parties are massive brain washing tools.
I was introduced to fairly standard economics in my final year of high school. I was not terribly impressed with all of the content that I learned (pretty socialist stuff in NZ high school economics curriculum). I also studied some economics in my first year at university. I knew there were some serious problems with the economics that I was learning, but I didn’t know exactly what was wrong..
In the first year of university, I was researching for an essay. I stumbled across a book of Rand’s in the local library (I think it was called ‘capitalism: the unknown virtue’). I then read Atlas Shrugged and ended up interested in the NZ libertarian party. Since then I’ve read a few books about economics (econ in one lesson, econ for real people, economic principles (bellve faustino), bastiat economics sophisms, menger’s principles, the amazing bread machine). These books have… refined… and improved what I thought after reading Atlas Shrugged (atlas shrugged very clearly left a lot to be desired, with her whole rabid atheism, selfishness thing, whereas I am simply against the initiation of the use of physical force against person or property).
tldr: a little rand (incl. atlas), some economics and a bit of thinking.
I was 14. I read Henry Hazlitt’s Economics In One Lesson. I never turned back.
You can see that the rest of the older lot here went through a different process. They considered various spectrum of ideas, and also went through one idea or experience, got disillusioned by it, kept thinking or trying to find answers, and finally found the answer in Austrian economics.
My introduction to economics WAS in Austrian economics itself, so I was a first-stage convert, who did not have to go through the same disillusionment or lifelong experiences to come to an idea.
Free market ideals managed to reach me the moment I started to be introduced to matters of the spectrum in economic thought. I must admit that since they got me while I was young, I was already immune to socialistic or collectivistic ideas, so I don’t think I’d be able to play devil’s advocate and understand exactly the perspective of a person who comes to believe in those ideas. The rest of you, who had to go through seeing different ideas, would know what makes a man come to that perspective. You had to be converted, I was already brought in.
There are few people as purely logical and precise as Hazlitt. With such clarity, he wrote the book, and made me understand economics so well. However, he wrote something in his book, which more or less said something along the lines of, “We must see how the greater whole benefits, and not just how one man might end up losing. But we must always keep one eye on that one man, no matter how small or alone, because his problems are just as genuine as any.” While I was already a converted freemarketer, it still stuck in my head, how we’d solve the problem of that One Man. That’s when I started learning about political ideas of liberty and natural law, and understood that in a free society, you have the right to pursue opportunities of happiness, but not the privilege of having to be given those opportunities by everyone else. So I realized, how does it matter if the One Man loses a little? That One Man is still a free man, and as a free man, can take one small loss that comes in a free society, but still has the chance to seek everything else and gain even more. And with that, I continued reading books on economics, now and then, afterwards, although it kinda slowed down through the years in school.
When I started reading Thomas Sowell (a Friedmanite, not an Austrian) years later, as a much older person, it only confirmed these things that I already understood, but in more specific light with respect to actual statistics and empirical evidence and examples. For years, I had the logical principles with me. Now, thanks to Sowell, I had the specific arguments to back them up. All the same, Sowell, being closer to Milton Friedman’s ideas, gave some reasons for having government, despite his support for free market. I still remain a little convinced by ideas of having government, which means that I lean a bit more towards Right Wing than Libertarian. But I never believed in federal government, only in simple local town governments, with voluntary participation of citizens.