Not really, since filming is not the only thing they were trying to get them to agree was OK. One of them, when arrested for filming, refused to give his name. They kept him in jail for about two months for not giving them his name. But that started with him filming.
Oh, I think I remember this now. Saw it on youtube or something. How large a jurisdictional area was the right to film granted to? Did it only apply to them, or to everyone?
As far as I know, just the one courtroom.
Hmm…that’s doesn’t seem like much of a concession. I was thinking this was for the whole municipality. But at least the principle has been established.
Years ago somebody suggested that people supporting secessionist movements in parts of Europe should do a very simple thing: stop playing any national Lotto or lottery. I know it’s not much (though it’s a nice little and steady cashflow guaranteed to enter the government’s coffers each week) but it would send a signal and, above all, it’s 100% legal. Nobody can persecute you for not playing Lotto or not buying lottery tickets. Did it work out? Not a chance.
You say we should stop fearing government… please explain how. Try opening a shop without applying for license and see how long you will last. Try resisting police coming to shut your shop up and, apart from the high chances of either being shot dead on the spot or savagely beaten, you’ll be depicted as the worst criminal since Hitler. And people will buy into that: you resisted the police after all… (Please know that I have absolutely nothing against most police officers, many of which are really good or even outstanding fellows just trying to do a very difficult job)
The only thing we can do right now is “muddle through” the Triumph of Socialism (guess who really won the Cold War?), sit tight and prepare for the time when Leviathan will either starve or choke itself to death. We know all too well that for all the mindless optimism of the media crew and the downright lies of the Generation Obama the present system is untenable even in the short run. It has already started to show very deep cracks not even massive doses of propaganda can mask. Perhaps most of you are too young to remember but back in the heydays of the Cold War the USSR was depicted by medias on both sides of the Iron Curtain as an unstoppable juggernaut whose ultimate and complete triumph was only a few years away. We truly believed when their leaders thundered “We will bury you”. We didn’t believe people like Mises who told us the Soviet empire would tumble down sooner than we’d believe or the rare visitors that saw what really laid beyond the carefully arranged tours: empty shelves, breadlines, primitive factories still using looted German machinery in the '70s etc.
I’d be honest with you: the best thing we can do right now is helping to hasten this inevitable conclusion by insinuating a doubt in other persons’ minds. Making them open their eyes is much harder since many will go back to believe all the hocus-pocus from the medias once the “crisis” is over. But at least that we can do with our scarce resources.
I have mentioned it quite a few times. Get enough people in a geographic location to participate. It may be that freestateproject.org is the only realistic option. But even if you could get twenty home-owners to stop paying property taxes in your area or twenty businesses in your area to stop applying for licenses, it may be enough. But the point is, it has to be more than just one person in an area that stops obeying.
No, it is not. It is promoting the abolition of government as we know it.
The Free State Project is not an exercise in minarchism. While it is true the founder Jason Sorens is a minarchist (which explains the ideology of the official website), many, many of the first 1000 early movers/ early adopters/ “super activists” are radical anarchists. Activism is decentralized (each person does what they like) and different tactics are tried, successful ones adopted by others, and harmful ones discarded. With the amount of press the activists get, some have chosen not to go wearing their anarchist ideas on their forehead opting to stay off the front page of the newspapers and rather be good neighbors and volunteer for local organizations. Generalizations will misrepresent the good libertarians that have moved to New Hampshire.
The decentralized network of people that is “the Free State Project” oppose all use of violence and ostracizes and shuns anyone that promotes violence. Some advocate living freely now and to cease obeying unjust government laws, while others advocate electioneering and changing government. Although there is heated disagreements, all agree to use peaceful means.
Migration to greener pastures is natural. We are just utilizing the internet to network with each other in the common goal of deliberate migration to promote our commonly shared idea through spontaneous, decentralized, creative action.
I think we should not expect perfection from something like FSP. I’m all for secession [ even if there is a state government established ] because it is one less state that is under the federal control. There could possibly be a ripple effect or a migration to this state and then work from there to deconstruct it into a anarchist society. I’m trying to recall some saying I heard a while ago, I think it was something like don’t let the good be the enemy of the perfect or something like that.
I agree with your thoughts, Laughing Man. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good is a great piece of wisdom.
Which is what Stranger brought up. Not that the FSPers are using direct violence action, but that trying to flood the electoral system away from the locals is a form of invasion.
Not to mention, I don’t think electioneering and changing government is capable of delivering any more than minarchism, and is certainly incompatible with libertarianism.
I’m not down with the FSP, simply because herding cats is not how we will advance. A liberty movement must be decentralized if it is going to be successful. If centralizing power, or gaining legitimacy at the ballot box could save liberty, it would already be done.
I have to disagree with you here liberty. What is incapable with libertarianism is not necessarily the devolution of the state into smaller aspects, but the premise that such a state [ minarchist ] is the end result. Secession should be right down to the individual level. If secession can happen at the state level, then I think that is a step in the right direction. However, if people were to suddenly stop there then I would say "No, keep going!’
No, you don’t. And you shouldn’t.
But I am compelled by reason! Lets make up a hypothetical. Say the Southern Confederacy rises up again and secedes from the rest of the US. Would you be against this? If so why? If not then why be against the FSR?
No.
Let’s not. Don’t confuse second-bests with progress. That is the enticing compromise behind the LP. It’s meant to centralize and negate our efforts.
Why would I care? Why would I care about this more than someone tax protesting?
The FSP has different people with different ideas, all drawn to one spot. Whoopity do. At this rate of movement, the US government will collapse on its own before there are enough FSPers to effect significant change in their liberty.
I view the FSP in the same way that I view Ron Paul. Both are raising questions and introducting principles that the majority of people would not have been introduced to otherwise. If it wasn’t for Ron Paul I wouldn’t be an anarchist, I wouldn’t care about economics or politics. Their positions might not be 100% compliant with Libertarian theory but they are sparking an interest in liberty inside thousands of individuals and that is something I’m certainly not against.
So large scale secession is not progress?
Because it shows the progression of libertarian ideals. It’s not perfect but nothing will be. To think that a state or a group of states secede from the federal government, a mass of individuals, that is not at the very least the progression towards the end result of individual secession?
Previously I remember you saying you will never see anarchy in our time, now that maybe true or it may not, the future is not determined, however, now you are saying whoopity doo towards a group of individual who are trying to secede in a mass movement? I’m rather confused with this whole sentiment. What are you expecting will transpire and why are you so reluctant to be at the very least sympathetic towards individuals who are at the very least are trying to decrease the size of government. Perhaps there is disagreements on where to stop the deconstruction but I think there should at the very least be agreement towards deconstruction in the first place.
Not if it is done under the premise that states are legitimate.
I am NOT a movement libertarian.
No.
Don’t assume they all have the same goals.
Obviously.
Government is a myth. Decreasing the size of a myth is not progress.
Minarchists are not fellow travelers. And people who use political action, are not libertarians. I’ve heard all of the arguments, they are nonsense.
Well if the view that states are legitimate is the sentiment of the FSR…then why are they seceding?
What do you mean by this?
How is it not progression? How is mass secession from the federal government not progression towards individual secession?
They are at least unified under the goal of deconstructing the state.
Government is a myth that people are willing to coerce and steal for. It is real for those who aggrandize it. Saying the government is such does not phase their irrational actions.
Rothbard and Big tent libertarianism by Walter Block
You and I are not going to get together, smoke dope, play the bongos and sing kumbaya. I’m not into groups, affiliations, badges, ranks, meetings or action plans.
What mass? It’s a non-sequitur.
Don’t post articles at me like I am a child and you are my teacher.
Ok so you don’t go to any libertarian rallys, Mises conferences, I mean what are you doing here at the Mises institution? This is a group is it not? You even go onto say in this very topic:
From what I gather from this quote and what you are saying now is that you hope that other people progress libertarianism..but they can’t come together, they can’t have plans, they can’t have meetings, and can’t have alliances [ if that is what you mean by affiliations ] we must drone on by ourselves, never meeting to espouse our ideas with a greater voice?
The individuals who are are joining the FSR are joining for a basic reason of trying to build a secession movement. Now what is stopping an anarchist from joining the FSR to help this secession movement and if ever successful then continue to push for individual secession?
I posted a lecture by Walter Block that deals with what we are discussing and I think it is rather illuminating. How you feel about reading such a post is beyond my control.