Freedom is what you have when no one is forcing their will on you. Everyone inherently recognizes this as a good thing because we all value our power to make decisions. We all value making decisions without being threatened. Unfortunately, most of us have not taken the time to consider the precise nature of freedom and its foundation in universal undeniable principles. Applying those principles to big issues may be complicated, but the concept of freedom is not. When applied consistently, it shows the way to a more harmonious society.
If somebody is forcing their will on us, clearly, we are not free. So perhaps it is helpful to think of freedom not as a substance, but as an ideal state of social harmony in which no one is forcing their will on anyone else. A violation of freedom is an attack on a particular victim whose will is being forcibly hindered by taking their life, stealing their property, or threatening them with assault. Freedom is not just an ideal state of society, but a moral code for respecting the rights of others.
Self-ownership is an integral part of being human. You own yourself. You own your body. You own your labor. For anyone to assert otherwise is to attempt to restrict your freedom or make you a slave.
Because you own yourself, it is wrong for someone to initiate force against you or your property. Acceptance of this simple fact is the foundation of a free and peaceful society. This universal non-aggression principle applies to everyone, and it is therefore wrong to kill, injure, assault, steal from, or threaten another person. Anyone who directly violates others, supports the violation of others, or violates others on behalf of someone else is holding us back from achieving our potential through the harmonious and mutually beneficial transactions that take place in freedom.
Very few people, even among government workers, have taken time to consider a precise definition of government. Governments get away with what they do because their true nature is obscured by propaganda. Most definitions describe “government” as the people in charge, but the foundation of control is always the threat of force. The authority claimed by governments is unique because it is considered license to use force or coercion against peaceful people. There is simply no way around it: government is control by force.
Government apologists claim it’s acceptable for a government to do something that an individual would never be allowed to do. This is why governments come up with special words to obscure what they’re really doing. War is mass murder. If an individual commits murder on their own, it is a crime and they should face consequences. But if an individual commits murder as part of a massive organized effort they might get a medal. Taxation is theft. If an individual kidnaps you for not giving them half your income, they go to jail. But if someone does that to you on behalf of government, they get a nice salary as a tax collector. No justification for these actions changes their fundamentally immoral nature. Nothing about the “divine right of kings,” the “will of the people,” or the “rule of law” has the power to justify an immoral act. Violent enforcers are essential to governments because without them, their threats would be meaningless.
To say that governments are premised on immorality is not to say everything they do is immoral. They often claim monopolies over very important functions in society, like helping the poor or protecting natural resources. The poor would be much better off and the environment would be much better protected if we did not entrust those functions to the same people who make war. Even when a government gives money to someone in need it must first steal that money from someone else. No noble act can excuse theft, as much as governments would like us to believe.
Government is fundamentally immoral because it is based on violating the rights of individuals. As much as we have progressed, it has not been because of governments but despite them. As free, beautiful, independent human beings, we own ourselves and should never let anyone tell us otherwise. We deserve self-rule. We deserve to be in charge of our own lives. No one has the right to control others by force, even if they claim to have the majority behind them.
It may be that in the course of society’s development, some control by force was inevitable. Out of weakness, we support some institutionalized violence only because we haven’t figured out a better way. We may have been convinced that government is a “necessary evil,” but because persuasion is always more powerful than coercion, it is inevitable that we will render it unnecessary.
Government is like a cancer. Less government is better than more government, just as less cancer is better than more cancer, but as long as it exists, it’s a threat. As long as society accepts the idea that force is the way to solve problems, the only limit on violence is what enforcers cannot be convinced to do. Government today could be described as a global tumor. While it can be eradicated locally, we will only be safe when it has been completely abolished.
Government is control. Government is exploitation. Government is a protection racket. Government is disorder, violence, and conflict! Government is an idea “so good” that it has to be forced on us. Government is a group of people claiming a monopoly on the initiation of force in a specific territory. Government is the institutionalization of our worst desires to control, dominate, and take advantage of others by force. Governments reflect our tolerance for oppression, and all we need to do to defeat them is demand self-government.
Systems of control that depend on victim participation reflect the way we think. If we believe a strong central authority with power over us is necessary, that is the kind of government we will get. Seeking and resisting control have always been part of life, but over time we have demanded more self-government. We have moved from acceptance of crude slavery and serfdom to demanding some role in “participatory” government. Statism is the ideology of turning to organized force to solve problems better solved through peaceful persuasion.
Considering how much force and violence have shaped our destiny, it is understandable why statism is so tempting. Do you care about the poor? Want to protect the environment? Care about national security? Value a society that makes education freely available? Governments would like you to think you have done your part on important social issues by voting and paying your taxes without thinking critically. The threat of violence makes government monopolies and other organized crime distinct from voluntary organizations. Even the good things they achieve are made possible by coercion.
Over the course of human history, as we have demanded more self-government, the government racket has adapted. At one point, it was accepted that whoever could pick up the biggest rock was in charge. Then we had to be convinced of the divine right of a king or queen. Then we needed a vote to be satisfied. The racket will be plenty lucrative until we see it for what it is. As we demand self-ownership, rather than participation in the oppression known as democracy, the racket will become impossible.
If it is wrong for one person to do something, why is it acceptable when 51% of a voting population agrees to hire someone to do it for them? Democracy is not freedom. When fully living up to its ideal, democracy is at best a majority coming up with an excuse to impose its will on a minority. More often, it is a completely bogus pretense for the powerful to exploit the rest of us as much as possible without creating more discontent than they can manage. Democracy also conveniently provides a false outlet for discontent with the promise of “change” from the next election.
As long as people demand a protection racket, they will get one. Regardless of what it is called, or what false ideology is used to justify it, government is based on forcing ideas on people. Statism is the dominant paradigm today because most of us are in denial or ignorant of its true nature. Dependence on government makes it scary to consider something new. When enough of us realize the ideals of freedom, and turn to cooperative solutions instead of turning to force to solve problems, the paradigm of statism will have passed, and the government racket will be seen for what it really is, before it is quickly abolished.
It takes severely twisted logic and a low sense of self-worth to deny that you own yourself. The very act of asserting this falsehood proves it wrong because the act of self-expression is an exercise of self-ownership! Anything less than self-ownership is slavery. All concepts of rights come from self-ownership. Your self-ownership is the acknowledgement by others of your right to control yourself. If you do not assert control over something of value, someone else will. Without the assertion of self-ownership, there is no freedom.
Self-ownership means you have freedom of speech, because you own your voice and can say what you want. If someone beats, steals from, or imprisons you for your speech, they are not “violating your right to free speech,” as much as they are violating your self-ownership, because they didn’t like what you said. Self-ownership means you have the right to remain silent, because to force someone to speak is an attempt to control their property by threatening them. Self-ownership means your body is a manifestation of your own unique, conscious choices and no one can take that away from you.
Because you own yourself, you are responsible for your actions. If you break something that belongs to another, you owe them what is necessary to make them whole. This also means you are responsible for and own what you produce. If you create something of value by combining natural resources with your labor, you have a right to control it. You can destroy it, consume it, trade it, or give it away. This simple framework for property by itself has the potential to solve many important disputes.
It is not possible for everyone to enjoy perfectly equal access to natural resources, but in a society which respects the rights of individuals, it is wrong to limit anyone’s access to resources that are not being utilized. Thus, it is wrong to pollute in a way that spoils natural resources others could use or enjoy. It is wrong to claim land in order to prevent its use. It is wrong to limit access to natural resources for those who would put them to good use.
Just as you have a right to defend yourself and decide how to do it, you have a right to assign relative value to your property and decide how to defend it. Under the current paradigm of statism, many governments take away these choices. Whether you like it or not, part of your income will fund a system that is based on injustice and a corrupt sense of property. A thorough respect for the principles of property is essential to a free, cooperative, and peaceful society.
Most conflicts center around property disputes. Disputes are sometimes based on confusion or sincere disagreement, but more often they are based on false claims to property. Such false claims are central to governments, which often assert that they, or the collectives they represent, own your income or your body. Governments also serve to enforce all types of false property constructs to serve the interests of the super rich. By obscuring the simple concept of property rights, governments have been able to commit untold injustice by transferring property from the poor to the rich. Justice requires a solid foundation in property rights.
From the foundation of self-ownership, we can build a system of justice based on property rights and the non-aggression principle. From this sense of justice, we can see that a free society would be one with only relationships free of force and coercion. This ideal would be a society free of violent control, and thus without anything like that which we call “government” today. This ideal society would be voluntary.
When all relations are voluntary, it means we enter into every exchange with another person by choice. We choose those exchanges based on what is in our best interest, rather than what someone else has chosen for us. When our rights are violated, some choice is taken from us. When governments say you can’t do something, it means if you do it, force will be used against you. While many of us still enjoy a great deal of independent decision-making, every aspect of our lives is affected by the threat of force.
Self-ownership means not only that you own yourself, but everyone owns themselves. The best way to ensure respect for our self-ownership is to respect the rights of others. Fortunately, most of us have no problem recognizing this principle and applying it in our daily lives. Even including government employees, relatively few people make their living directly by theft and murder. Unfortunately, society tends to carve out a special morals-free area for government agents. When you learned "don't hit" and "don't steal," it wasn't "unless you work for the government." When you learned not to kill, it wasn't "unless a politician says it’s ok." Everything government does is made possible by violating someone’s rights.
Because people are prone to interpersonal violence, the absolute ideal of a purely voluntary society might be impossible. There could be a truly free and voluntary world, but the moment someone gets punched in the face, for the victim, the world is not very free! However, that does not mean we should not strive for a more free and peaceful society, or not work vigorously to eliminate violent aggression.
We are living in the most peaceful times in all of human history. Right now, we are less likely than ever before to be subject to violence from another person. That is a beautiful thing and it should be celebrated! Imagine how much more difficult life was for our ancestors living in a world where they had to live in relative fear of their fellow humans! Imagine how much more difficult trade and cooperation were with a lower level of trust. Sadly, governments today have more than replaced our distrust with other false fears and our lives are more thoroughly governed by force than ever before.
In a world without government (a world in which forced relations are the rare exception), trust is high, individual rights are respected, and the climate for cooperation is ideal. Only in this situation is every person capable of achieving their potential. Every time we fail to respect the self-ownership of others it diminishes our potential. Every threat of force limits choices. Every act of violence holds back humanity. The understanding that we should work toward a free society by ridding all relations of force is known as voluntaryism.