Burying Larken
Rose's Superstitious
Nonsense
Jason Unruhe
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Burying Larken
Rose's Superstitious
Nonsense
A debunking of the view of authority
"The Most Dangerous Superstition"
by Larken Rose
JASONUNRUHE
MRN Publishing
Niagara Falls
©2014
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For my friend Pierre who is convinced that the
Zionists and the government are behind it all.
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"Accordingly, the point of this book is not that “government”
should be abolished, but that “government”– a legitimate ruling
class – does not and cannot exist, and that failure to recognize
this fact has led to immeasurable suffering and injustice."
- Larken Rose, 2011
The irony here is that if government doesn't exist to him, then it
isn't causing a problem. Thus his entire book has been refuted
with his own words.
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Table of Contents
Introduction .
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No Investigation, Nonsense Speech .
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A Convenient Hypocritical Definition .
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Rose Rationalizes His Irrational View .
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Yes, Consent is Real .
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Rose's Myth of the Government as a Class .
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Representative Democracy: Who Owns Who?
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56
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Introduction
This book "The Most Dangerous Superstition" by Larken Rose
was given to me by a friend as we stood in the lobby of the
Provincial Offenses court of Ontario. I was there to show support
for him as he was going to into the courtroom to defend himself
from several traffic tickets that were given to him as form of
police harassment. He was being punished for daring to sue the
police for committing several dishonorable acts against him.
Trying to pass the time until everyone was called into the
courtroom he handed me the book.
We have always had a bit of an understanding. He is a right wing
libertarian and I am Marxist. So as you can imagine it makes for
some interesting political and social exchanges. We do have our
understanding, we disagree but we are both there to support
each other tackle the unjust actions of the police and state. He
handed me the book by Rose telling me that it was "going to
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change my view of the world", and that it would hopefully drag
me away from being a communist.
I had only a moment to glace at it but it seemed very libertarianish to me. The interesting part was when my friend told me Rose
calls himself an Anarchist while supporting the idea of
capitalism. I explained to my friend that Anarchists reject
capitalism in all forms. From Proudhon, to Kropotkin to Emma
Goldman, they all categorically reject capitalism. He complained
to me trying to put people in a box for categories to define
things. He insisted that an Anarchist was someone who rejected
government. I responded by saying that his claim was untrue
and that the architects of Anarchism rejected capitalism and
government. Capitalism is authority. Unfortunately he thinks
capitalism can exist without a state, which is possibly one of the
most ridiculous political and economic philosophies ever.
There wasn't time for me to really read anything in the book
given the situation we were in. I did however say that when I got
home I would look for a copy of the book and read it. After
reading the introduction I messaged that friend on Skype and
told him I would write a reply to it. He was very eager to see it
and I assume he will be nonplussed about the reply when he
reads it.
I will, in this ebook demonstrate that the crux of Rose's book,
the view of Authority, is logically flawed and even hypocritical.
From this the entire premise of the book collapses making the
rest of it nonsense.
So Pierre, this one is for you...
9
The Superstition of Authority:
No Investigation, Nonsense Speech
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The first part of Larken Rose's book is dedicated to describing
the myth that is the government. Now he doesn't use the word
"government" at first, he merely uses the vague term of
"authority". This can be a bit misleading due to its vagueness. I
wasn't sure what he was talking about right away because of its
non specific nature. However later he does say that he is
specifically referring to government. Knowing this ahead of time
would make the introduction clearer to the reader, but I assume
he has his reasons for doing this.
I think the reason he did that was to put an anti-authority
mindset into the reader to prepare them to confront his idea of
government. He is clearly indicating that he's of the opinion that
people think they need the government. This is true, but I think
he believes it a bit more than is true. There are plenty who are
ant-government while there are many who are for limited
government. He doesn't seem to make that distinction. I don't
know if he takes people who want limited government into
account when he makes this claim. I don't think he does.
Yes, I agree that he does need to make it clear to the reader that
the book is going to be anti-authority. What I think is wrong here
is that he seems to be confusing two separate but related things.
Is this book anti-authoritarian or anti-authority? It appears that
he floats back and forth between them, sometimes even
merging the two ideas into one. He is conflating the idea of
authority with someone or something, in a way, having too
much authority. Later into the book he becomes a little more
specific but he still seems to float between the two issues as if
they were one and the same.
This is very problematic when you're trying to express this idea
in a work which is what Rose is doing. What he describes as
authority he sees as a myth or superstition, which is not
material. What he describes as authoritarian is the government,
which is a material thing. Because he conflates the two, we can't
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tell where, in his opinion, one ends and the other begins. They
are not the same concept, and should be treated as two
separate but related concepts.
Authority is an idea that people hold. It is something that exists
in their minds that they can put into effect. It is a concept that
they answer to, or are in control of a material thing. Authority
itself is non material, it doesn't physically exist. Authoritarian is
the physical manifestation of authority. It is this that kicks in
your door in the middle of the night. It is the coercive arm of
whatever idea (authority) it is controlled by. One does not
necessarily follow the other. Authority in an academic field is not
enforced by an act of coercion. It can in a very limited form, but
it isn't necessarily or really carried out.
He is starting out from a point of not being able to tell the
difference between the material and the non-material. I'm sure
if you asked him, he would answer in the affirmative to what I
have just explained. What he doesn't do is treat those two as
separate things in his book. He makes them one in the same
inseparable idea. This is one problem with the basis for his book.
There are others, like not being able to identify competing
interest between groups. He can only see vague ones. Other
times he just describes authority as existing for the sake of itself
and not recognizing that it is a means to carry out the interest of
one group of people over another.
He doesn't differentiate between the idea and the act of
carrying it out as being to separate but related things. An idea
can exist (non-materially) with a force carrying it out.
Allow me to continue...
Rose does get some aspects of our modern (and past) society
right. He does correctly identify that people often don't question
the brutality of history because they don't want to know. He
believes that this is because people are attached to the ideas
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that caused it. This claim is a half truth. He is under the
impression that it is merely because of authority that people
won't question why some of histories' greatest barbarities are
carried out. There's often times no need for an authority
because everyone was of a consensus on an idea.
A prime example would be the African slave trade that killed
over 100 million Africans. There was no authority that forced
people to think that Africans were not human beings and thus
undeserving of rights. Sure religion told people they weren't.
Religion even justified the owning of slaves on the pretext that
the Biblical Abraham had them. This is not an act of authority
according to Rose. In his book he says:
“Government,” however, does not simply
suggest or request; it commands, But an
advertiser who says “Act now!” or a preacher
who tells his congregation what to do could
also be said to be giving commands, but they
are not “government.”
Unlike the “commands” of preachers and
advertisers, the commands of “government”
are backed by the threat of punishment, the
use of force against those who do not comply,
those who are caught “breaking the law.” But
even that does not give us a complete
definition, because street thugs and bullies
also enforce their commands, but they are
not “government.” The distinguishing feature
of “authority” is that it is thought to have the
right to give and enforce commands. In the
case of “government,” its commands are
called “laws,” and disobeying them is called
“crime.”
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This means, because of his conflation of authority and the acts
of authority, the preacher telling people that Africans are not
human, is not using force. Even if we took this to mean strictly
government, the government didn't carry out slavery. Very large
private companies did it, not state owned enterprises. People in
America (in this context) almost universally approved of slavery
because they believed that Africans were not humans. The
government did not make people believe this idea, as it existed
before the government did. Slavery in North America began
around 1619.
It's true that many people don't want to look at this. Not
because of the notion that they are attached to an authority
behind it, which according to Rose they are raised to support; it
is because they would be criticizing their country. This "love of
country" isn't necessarily associated with the government. Many
people in the United States "love their country hate their
government". What Rose claims here is not applicable to the
single worse atrocity of all time. This happens because he can't
separate the two ideas.
Another example would be the force which the Vikings and
other nomadic barbarians used to survive.
While barbarians lived in tribes you certainly couldn't accuse
them of having a government as Larken defines it. They had
chiefs who directed society up until a certain point. (It's
important to note that different groups had different ideas
about leadership and how it worked.) They were relatively
egalitarian in that there wasn't much of a power structure
(depending on the barbarian tribe). So certainly Larken cannot
claim of "government authority" leading and/or controlling their
actions as he defines it.
It's no secret that they pillaged a lot, entering villages and just
stealing everything people had and often killing them afterward.
This is a great inhumanity, but it was by no means directed by a
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government. They were going to do this regardless of their
leadership. They did it because they were stealing what it took
to survive. They did it out of at least perceived necessity. If they
didn't steal food, livestock or what have you, they were going to
die. No authority coerced them into taking these actions; they
took them because of necessity.
In this book Rose takes all "negative" human action and reduces
it to action ordered by authority. This is simply not true, and it is
a misrepresentation of history and how history and human
society developed. It is essentially reducible to government
came into existence and government is evil.
He says all these bad things happened because of the belief in a
superstition, that superstition being the authority of the
government. This statement is astoundingly detached from
reality. He literally claims only government can do bad things.
The vast majority of suffering and injustice in
the world, today and spanning back
thousands of years, can be directly attributed
to a single idea. It is not greed or hatred, or
any of the other emotions or ideas that are
usually blamed for the evils of society.
Instead, most of the violence, theft, assault
and murder in the world is the result of a
mere superstition... [being authority].
Authority caused the majority of suffering and injustice? Even
thousands of years ago? The overwhelming majority of violence
against women in the world is caused by individual men harming
women. There is little to no authority in these acts. This is
especially true when they are committed against women in the
secular first world. According to Larken Rose's definition, there is
little to no authority in these acts. This is especially true when
they are committed against women in the secular First World.
This essentially denies the existence of patriarchy.
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Government and government authority is not the end all be all
of bad things that happen. Despite the claims of libertarians like
Rose, greed and hate can cause people to do bad things. For
example, racism is a bad thing and it is perpetuated by hatred.
Mass poverty globally is created by greed, hoarding money and
resources away from people who need them.
The oversimplification is to the point of nonsense that all
authority goes against civilization and morality. This is not true;
there are authorities that are very beneficial. This claim he
makes he takes literally.
The belief in “authority,” which includes all
belief in “government,” is irrational and
selfcontradictory; it is contrary to civilization
and morality, and constitutes the most
dangerous, destructive superstition that has
ever existed. Rather than being a force for
order and justice, the belief in “authority” is
the arch-enemy of humanity.
Apparently Rose has never heard of society. The authority of the
government built roads, hospitals and highways. It brought
electricity and running water to people's homes. It didn't just do
it; it required government to do it. Is this considered to be
contrary to civilization? Is the First World development of
infrastructure (which he enjoys) and living standards therein the
product of something that is anti-civilization? If this all runs
counter to morality, then what does Rose consider to be
immoral?
Western civilization, including the Soviet Union have made the
greatest advancements in science through state funding which
the government has the authority to give out. Living conditions,
and life expectancy were increased by both; medical technology
was increased by both. What is his basis for saying this is "the
most dangerous, destructive superstition that has ever existed"?
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He is literally ignoring the achievements of the last 200 years of
development that came about as a result of governmental
organization and funding of projects.
Does Rose prefer to have dirt roads and live without running
water and electricity? Does he think this would have just
magically developed some other way through the... free market I
suppose?
If according to Rose all authority is bad, what does he think
about the boss at work? You know the owner of a private
company, the capitalist? He is the ultimate authority in the work
place. How does Rose being a libertarian deal with that massive
contradiction? I'm assuming he isn't against private ownership
of the means of production and employing others in their use.
That would make him the authority in the work place that
everyone has to submit to. The capitalist work place is a very
authoritative structure where you can be removed (punished)
on the slightest whim.
The problem is that Rose just generalizes uses the word
authority and gives a description of it which many forces can be
described. By that conclusion, for him we can assume he is
opposed to capitalism as well. Of course he isn't, he is a
libertarian and propounds the theory of "that's not real
capitalism." His over simplified view of authority is contradicted
sharply by his personal economic views. He doesn't know that
his is contradicting himself.
Rose describes his views on why we are this way towards
authority. He says that people are raised to think that obeying
authority is a virtue, in most cases. Yes this is true, we do live in
a society and that society has rules. You have to learn the rules
in order to function. I assume by this he means that he disagrees
with the rules. Okay, that is fine but that doesn't mean that
learning to play by the rules is inherently bad. What is wrong
with our society (in this context) is that people are not trained to
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question that authority. The laws may be just or unjust; we can
only determine that by questioning them. This is not
accomplished by simply dismissing that authority automatically.
If he has made his decision that the government or what have
you is wrong, then so be it. What he is implying here is that
government is automatically wrong for being government and
we are raised to submit to it. It is not that simple.
We are raised to obey authority but that doesn't begin with
government. There is a natural tendency to obey authority in
every person because if we didn't listen we would all die in our
childhood. When we are born we are not self-sufficient, we rely
on our parents to survive. They give us commands to live by that
act towards ensuring our survival. We don't have a choice; we're
not capable of taking care of ourselves at this point. This
authority cannot be avoided and cannot be rebelled against. It is
built into each and every one of us. Later we are taught to live
by the rules of the society, we are unfortunately not taught to
question those rules.
This book is a very convoluted idea of morality. Authority is
wrong, so therefore he is arguing some kind of morality.
Authority is seemingly according to him immoral, so therefore
the opposite must be moral. He specifically states that he is not
advocating a rejection of morality.
In fact, people have been so thoroughly
trained to associate obedience with “being
good” that attacking the concept of
“authority” will sound, to most people, like
suggesting that there is no such thing as right
and wrong, no need to abide by any
standards of behavior, no need to have any
morals at all. That is not what is being
advocated here – quite the opposite.
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Indeed, the reason the myth of “authority”
needs to be demolished is precisely because
there is such a thing as right and wrong, it
does matter how people treat each other,
and people should always strive to live moral
lives. Despite the constant authoritarian
propaganda claiming otherwise, having
respect for “authority” and having respect for
humanity are mutually exclusive and
diametrically opposed. The reason to have no
respect for the myth of “authority” is so that
we can have respect for humanity and justice.
This statement is a horrible mess of contradictory statements.
How do you define morals? How does one live a moral life?
What is the basis for those morals? Whatever the basis for those
morals is would become the authority on those morals. Even if
you are the only one who follows that particular definition of
morals, that definition would become that authority. You would
become subject to that authority. You can't separate morals
from authority because those morals are based on some kind of
guide which would constitute an authority. Morals don't appear
out of thin air, they are defined by something. There is no
objective morality, thus there must be a subjective guide
produced.
Authority is inseparable from justice as well. The definition of
justice is:
1. the quality of being just; righteousness,
equitableness, or moral rightness: to uphold
the justice of a cause.
2. rightfulness or lawfulness, as of a claim or
title; justness of ground or reason: to
complain with justice.
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3. the moral principle determining just
conduct.
4. conformity to this principle, as manifested
in conduct; just conduct, dealing, or
treatment.
5. the administering of deserved punishment
or reward.
No matter which definition you use, it would be entirely based
on an authority. Justice is itself an authority because it
determines a code of conduct. Rose clearly has in his mind some
kind of interpretation of what justice is. I don't think he makes it
clear in the book, but on his blog he says he believes in the "nonAggression Principal".i That principal is an authority that he
(supposedly) follows. If that principal had no authority as a guide
by which to conduct himself, he wouldn't follow it.
This story about how "having respect for 'authority' and having
respect for humanity are mutually exclusive and diametrically
opposed" is utter nonsense. What do you define as respect for
humanity? The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a
pretty good standard to go by. (I'd say there are some flaws but
over all its pretty good.) These laws are designed to define what
respect for human life is. The UN has authority to determine
those rights. If authority and these universal rights diametrically
opposed, then therefore these rights either don't exist or are to
be considered bad in the eyes of Rose.
I assume once again that Rose has his own view as to what
respect for humanity is. What is his basis for the belief? His
would differ from mine greatly. Whatever they may be, to
enforce those rights you have to have an authority. When mine
conflicted with his why should I recognize his view? Under what
authority does he have to "force" them on me? What authority
do I have to force mine on him?
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If there is no authority behind what it means to "have respect
for humanity", then it doesn't mean anything at all. Something
has to define what that respect is. That something would be an
authority. The contradictions here in Rose's are absolutely
astounding. He demands respect and justice but rejects any
means by which to define what they are because they could
violate rejecting authority. It really seems as though Rose has no
idea what he is talking about.
As normally with libertarians he brings up the subject of
personal responsibility. In this case he is not talking about the
whole people are poor because they chose to be nonsense. Here
he is referring to being responsible for your own actions by
"thinking for yourself" or, more specifically given his context,
refusing authority. To be clear, let me show you what he means
in his own words:
"...being a moral person requires taking on
the personal responsibility of judging right
from wrong and following one’s own
conscience, the opposite of respecting and
obeying “authority.”"
His anti-authoritarian philosophy is extremely convoluted. He
says specifically that obeying authority is wrong and counter to
human rights and justice. Everyone lives by their own view of
what is moral, that view is an authority because it determines
the actions of the individual. However if you obey that authority
you created you are not being moral. Thus you have to reject the
authority you created. If following that authority is being
immoral, then you can't create one to follow. If you're not
following a moral guide then you are not being moral. We must
come to the conclusion that moral doesn't, and can't exist in his
mind.
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Once again we have the problem of Rose not differentiating
between authority the concept, and authoritarianism the
material manifestation.
There's so much more wrong here. As a libertarian I suppose he
follows the non-Aggression Principal. According to this terrible
joke of an idea, the principal itself is an authority. The NAP itself
is the guide which you are supposed to go by. Libertarians say
people have to live by it. Doesn't this become an authority?
Believers of the NAP literally call this a moral guide by which to
conduct one's self. But this is also an authority and not rejecting
authority is immoral. So we have a case here that following it
and not following it is immoral.
I think I have to expand upon this contradiction a bit further.
Libertarians have the NAP as a moral guide, and in their society
people would be expected to abide by it. If someone didn't
abide by it, they claim they would use private police forces to
enforce it. So literally men with guns will come and enforce the
idea which rejects the concept of using force. This NAP is an
authority and it has the muscle behind it in the form of private
police. Rose defines government authority as something that is,
"backed by the threat of punishment, the use of force against
those who do not comply, those who are caught “breaking the
law.”" The NAP is now the law and authority. Those private
police are "the use of force against those who do not comply".
I know what Rose is really trying to say. He is trying to say that
all government authority is wrong, so therefore to be moral you
must reject all government authority. His extremist view that the
government is always wrong is problematic. The government
told us to fight the Nazis (because they are wrong) so I guess by
his logic the Nazis were right. The Nazi government told its
people to fight so therefore the Nazi government was wrong.
This mess of an anti-authority philosophy turns into the Nazis
being both right and wrong at the same time.
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My guess is that Rose like almost all libertarians, doesn't
understand philosophy at all.
Not only does Rose not understand authority in a philosophical
sense, he doesn't understand it in a historical sense as well. To
be clear, I mean he doesn't understand why people did the
certain things it is they did. He reduces all negative historical
events to being the product of authority. To him there is no
necessity to do anything that ever happened in history.
Everything negative that did happen was someone merely
following an authority blindly. This is not true; there are material
causes for the events in history that unfolded. All the
complexities of cause in history cannot be singularly reduced to
authority. This is his example:
One nasty individual who loves to dominate
others is a trivial threat to humanity unless a
lot of other people view such domination as
legitimate because it is achieved via the
“laws” of “government.” The twisted mind of
Adolf Hitler, by itself, posed little or no threat
to humanity. It was the millions of people
who viewed Hitler as “authority,” and thus
felt obligated to obey his commands and
carry out his orders, who actually caused the
damage done by the Third Reich. In other
words, the problem is not that evil people
believe in “authority”; the problem is that
basically good people believe in “authority,”
and as a result, end up advocating and even
committing acts of aggression, injustice and
oppression, even murder.
The ignorance of historical events he is astounding. The idea that
people followed Hitler simply because he was an authority is
astoundingly ignorant. When Hitler came to be in the
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government, he did so through a democratic vote, he was not in
a position of authority. Hitler didn't start in authority he had to
be voted in. People had to choose to have him there. People
followed him because they (wrongly) chose to do so. It was not
blind faith in authority because he was not authority yet. This
simple bold and obvious fact is completely ignored by Rose in
order to justify his view that the Nazis (and therefore the
German population) only did what they did because Hitler was
an authority.
Hitler was welcomed with open arms when he and the Nazi
Party came into power. The country had been devastated by
World War 1 and was suffering from massive inflation and
required extensive rebuilding. The Party formulated a plan to fix
the economy and get Germany back on its feet. This plan
created jobs, cured inflation and eventually built the nation up
to super power status that was capable of fighting the world at
one point. This recovery from dark times and low self-esteem is
what made people want to follow Hitler. He made promises of a
better tomorrow for the German people and he delivered on
them. This success and restoration of German pride is what
made him so great in the eyes of the people. That's why they
followed his leadership, because he did a good job. Yes Hitler
was evil and went on to commit one of the worst crimes in
history, but that does not change, nor come close to explaining
why he had popular support.
There is another reason why the Nazi Party was so popular when
they were first coming into power. A lot of the high ranking
Nazis were in their 20s, some in their early 30s. Hitler was
notable exception as he was 44 when he came into full
leadership of the country. Why is this significant you ask? Well
the country had been under the rule of very old men with very
old ideas, almost all of them imperial tradition that refused to
see that the world was changing. Parliamentary republics were
how countries were governing now and these old men of
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tradition refused to understand that. They had old ideas about
social order and they way things should be. These ideas were
stifling and constrictive. They were very bogged down in old
ways of thinking. People found this very repressive and wanted
to break away from it.
This is when the Nazi Party appeared. Young men full of fresh
new ideas about pride and restoring the country. They
represented a break from the stuffy repressive old conservative
order. The ideas of the old order led them to ruin during and
after the war. People dropped support for them left and right.
The Nazis came with a message of hope and a dramatic plan to
make Germany proud and powerful once again. This idea
attracted voters. Yes there was anti-Semitism, but much was lost
in the idea of grand republic and self-respect. This is what made
people want to vote for the Nazis, this is what made people
want to follow the Nazi Party, not some notion of Hitler being an
"authority". The man hadn't even been elected yet. How could
he be an authority according to Rose's definition of what
authority is?
Hitler then carried out what he promised to do. The German
economy recovered, people got back to work and inflation was
brought under control. People followed him because they voted
for him. Once he had eliminated democracy people continued to
follow him because he had technically done well for German
people. There was a cost to what he did and there was also the
anti-Semitism, but to the people he had done what he promised
he would do. Why not follow a leader who does that? They were
not following him simply because he was an authority, but
because he was a man who on a level, did keep his word and
delivered on his promises. There are other reasons to follow
people besides authority.
Allow me to take this further into what he is probably referring
to. I assume when he invoked the name of Hitler he was bringing
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up the obedience behind those who fought for Germany in
World War 2 and the SS personnel who were responsible for
carrying out the Holocaust. His assumption, that he constantly
made, is that people committed that terrible deed because they
were obeying Hitler's authority. It relies on at least three false
premises:
1. No one actually agreed with exterminating of the Jews. No
one was anti-Semitic and wanted to carry out the Holocaust
because they agreed with its goal.
2. No one would ever consider what they were doing was wrong
and that everyone fully blindly did what they were told
regardless of how inhuman the actions were.
3. Everyone in the German population knew the Holocaust was
happening.
These are hidden assumptions Rose makes when claiming that
everyone only did what they did, because they just followed an
authority. None of these statements are true. They are all false
and run in contradiction to what actually happened during that
time. Without knowing it he is making these claims. Once these
hidden assumptions are no longer hidden, we can see how false
his statement is.
There were people who agreed with the idea of exterminating
the Jews. Anti-Semitism was rampant and in that part of the
world during that time (and to a degree now). It was around
long before Hitler was and cannot be reduced to just him. You
can however blame him for whipping up so much more hate
towards the Jews given the massive propaganda campaign he
carried out among the population of Germany. When people
entered the military they looked for specific people who
displayed a particularly vile hatred for the Jews to put into
special sections of the SS. Those particular people wanted to
carry out the killings of Jews because they believed them to be
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inferior, a disease, the cause of Germany's problems etc. They
didn't do it because they were simply obeying authority because
that's what they were trained to do. The military is of course
based on this idea, I'm not denying that. You cannot claim
however that they only did it because authority told them too
when that authority specifically sought out select people who
wanted to do that to Jewish people.
Despite this selective process there is evidence that some SS
soldiers posted to the death camps suffered mental illnesses
because of the horrors they saw and were a party to. Heinrich
Himmler himself expressed concern for the mental health of SS
guards who controlled the camps afraid of the damage it could
do to them.ii There have been reports of heavy drinking among
soldiers stationed at Auschwitz as a result of their horrific acts.
Depression was also a big issue, Himmler's concerns were well
justified. Even those that agreed with the idea of killing the Jews
eventually began having problems with what they were doing. If
this was not the case then these symptoms of a troubled mind
would not have appeared.
No doubt many fearful of punishment continued to do what
they did in the Concentration Camps despite not wanting to
participate any longer. Some even deserted their posts and went
underground in order to escape.
Speaking to the third hidden assumption, there is no evidence to
suggest that the population of Germany knew the Holocaust was
going on. The government and the SS went to good lengths to
obscure the reality of what was going on. Even the punch card
system (thanks IBM) used to determine where each deported
Jewish person was going did not have Concentration Camp on
them; they merely said "other". Many Germans at the end of the
war denied that the Holocaust had happened and that the US
forces were fabricating the claim in order to demonize them.
There is footage of civilians being brought to the Dachau camp. iii
27
There they saw lamps and paintings made from human skin. In
addition they saw the living quarters and vehicles carrying the
bodies of killed Jews. The civilians were horrified at what they
saw.
What they did not do was carry out the killings because of
authority. They didn't even know they were going on.
I think what else Rose may have been referring to was the old, "I
was just following orders," line that Nazi soldiers used when put
on trial. It was all the rage at Nuremburg. The truth is they knew
what they were doing, they agreed with what they were doing.
This line about orders was intended to use the logic of military
organization to absolve them of any personal responsibility for
the crimes they committed. Rose makes it seem like they used
this as a reason why they did it. No, they used it as a justification
for why they should not be punished for having done it.
Rose clearly has no idea what went on in Germany and doesn't
know why people did what they did. He simply reduces
everything to authority. He completely ignores the extensive
propaganda that went on and pre-existing anti-Semitism. Again
we see the libertarian view; everything is always the fault of
government and nothing else.
To answer his original statement, no, one person isn't as big a
threat as a person with government authority. This statement is
true. The problem is that Rose stands from the position that
government can only do bad things, so therefore there should
be no government. All government is is an organizational form
of people that carries out actions. They can be good or bad. The
government did good things like spread vaccines to stop the
spread of deadly diseases. It did a good thing in organizing public
education so that everyone can have some degree of education.
As I have already demonstrated the crimes of the Nazis were not
carried out by 'the “laws” of “government.”' The motivations
were not because the government had authority; it was because
28
the government made a good case for what it did publicly and
hid what it did privately. No one said what they did in that war
was right because the government told them too. They said they
did it because they thought it was right for them to be doing so.
Then they claimed they 'were just following orders' to get away
from being punished for what they agreed to do.
Would all these horrors have still happened without
government? I think in some form it still would. You don't need
a government to do things like this. You just need a high level of
organization. Blaming the government for this is just
nonsensical. A government just allows people to do things on a
larger scale because of the organization capacities of it. A
government is a tool. This is no different than blaming deaths on
guns and not the people suing them. If Rose doesn't understand
this then all he is really doing is making an argument against
collective effort.
To finish this off I can't but help scratch my head when I see a
libertarian saying that people are good. Rose specifically says
that good people follow bad government:
"In other words, the problem is not that evil
people believe in “authority”; the problem is
that basically good people believe in
“authority,” and as a result, end up
advocating and even committing acts of
aggression, injustice and oppression, even
murder."
The basic premise of all libertarians is that capitalism is good and
government is bad. They make all the usual defenses of
capitalism including the idea that selfishness is a virtue. They
also propound the idea that human nature is inherently bad.
Thus as a result we have to have capitalism because it harnesses
the "badness" in us. However he states here that people are
inherently good, and that its government that makes people do
29
bad things. There is a complete contradiction here between his
claim and the ideology he follows.
There is a tremendous amount of writing I can do here to show
the hypocritical nature of believing in capitalism and being
against the use of authority and force. However I don't have the
time for that here.
A Convenient Hypocritical Definition
Here Rose begins his specific definition of what authority is.
Before warned, he is not going to give the definition of
authority. He makes an extremely selective definition. It only
contains what he doesn't like and rejects anything he does like.
It's basically cherry picking of what authority is. He takes only a
few aspects of what authority is and excludes the rest. This way
he can present a view of authority that is completely detached
from the context in which it exists. This somewhat vague
definition can only exist in one context. That context is the
society in which we live, the modern bourgeois republic. This is
the only definition he gives. He specifically tailors it to what he
personally doesn't like so that an equally applicable force that
works (theoretically) in his favour wouldn't count as authority. It
would count as an authority itself, but since he likes it, he plays
word games or outright dishonestly to exclude it.
To define where and how people are taught to submit to
authority he begins with childhood. His explanation here is
completely detached from the material conditions in which it
exists. His example of programming to obey authority in life
begins with childhood, learning from your parents and teachers.
Well you actually do have to obey your parents and teachers.
This is because a child literally doesn't know anything about how
the world works or even simple things like cooking. In order for a
person to be self-sustaining you have to learn the skills
necessary to accomplish that. You are taught this ability by an
authority which you have to obey. You have to obey your
30
teachers because if you don't you won't learn anything. This is
not the same as college and university; we are talking about
children here. Parents too must be obeyed from the moment of
birth. A child literally won't survive without the parents to
shelter and feed it. When parents tell a child not to run out into
the streets and similar such commands, the child must obey or it
will die.
The complaint by Rose is that this is part of a system that
teaches people to be obedient. Well tough Rose, a child does
have to be obedient to the parent or teacher authority. There is
no way around this, it has to happen. It happens because the
child is incapable of making any such decision because they
don't know anything about the world around them. Thus as a
result they cannot make an informed rational choice. As a child
pretty much all of us would have just eaten candy all the time
and ended up dying from malnutrition. Rose's complaint here
about the source of us being taught to obey is downright
ridiculous. Even on a most basic level you cannot separate the
authority of parents from a child. By that I mean there is no
context in which a child can exist independent of the authority
of the parent, or some other authority fulfilling that role.
Since there is no possible way of escaping this authority due to
the material conditions in which we exist, not calling it authority
in this context is nothing more than ridiculous idealism. In a few
moments I will show you why it is covered by his definition.
To continue Rose tries to explain where people's beliefs come
from:
The trouble is that the average person’s belief
system rests upon a hodgepodge of vague,
often
contradictory,
concepts
and
assumptions. Terms such as morality and
obedience, laws and legislatures, leaders and
citizens are used constantly by people who
31
have never rationally examined such
concepts. The first step in trying to
understand the nature of “authority” (or
“government”) is to define what the word
means, What is this thing called
“government”?
This claim which he is making about people who don't follow his
philosophy on authority is an exact definition of what he himself
thinks. His whole view of authority is contradictory, full of
hidden assumptions and even childishly hypocritical at times.
The idea of morality itself is an authority. Even if just a single
person creates their own view of morality and follows it, it is an
authority. However Rose defines authority as something that
forces you to follow it. If this personal code of morality had no
ability to make the person follow it, it wouldn't exist. So it is an
authority and has the ability to make the person follow it. This is
how Rose defines authority. The same goes with the teacher and
parent. They give commands and they have ways of forcing you
to comply. Rose takes this exact definition and says it only
applies to government. Even though other authorities fit the
exact same definition (he gave) they don't count without any
explanation given.
“Government” tells people what to do. But
that by itself does not give us a sufficient
definition, because all sorts of individuals and
organizations tell others what to do.
“Government,” however, does not simply
suggest or request; it commands, But an
advertiser who says “Act now!” or a preacher
who tells his congregation what to do could
also be said to be giving commands, but they
are not “government.”
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Unlike the “commands” of preachers and
advertisers, the commands of “government”
are backed by the threat of punishment, the
use of force against those who do not comply,
those who are caught “breaking the law.” But
even that does not give us a complete
definition, because street thugs and bullies
also enforce their commands, but they are
not “government.” The distinguishing feature
of “authority” is that it is thought to have the
right to give and enforce commands. In the
case of “government,” its commands are
called “laws,” and disobeying them is called
“crime.”
So the only thing here that defines what an authority is, is the
ability to extract punishment against someone for disobeying it.
Of course this is nowhere near a rational definition of authority.
Authority can come in many forms. However for the sake of
proving his philosophy wrong I'll continue here with his
definition of authority.
Firstly I don't know where Rose gets the idea that religion
doesn't count as an authority according to his criteria. In his
statement he uses quotation marks around commands when
referring to commands by religion so I'm assuming this means he
doesn't think they are real commands. They are not commands
to him because he doesn't think they are backed by a "threat of
punishment" or force. Well as someone who went to a Catholic
school (or just lived in a society that has religion in it) I can tell
you that there very much is a threat of punishment. That
punishment is Hell, the threat of which is a pretty big part of
Christianity. Rose lives in the United States,iv which is the most
religious First World nation, with possibly the exception of Israel.
33
I assume Rose doesn't think of this as a threat of punishment
because he is an atheist. Despite that fact the threat is seen as
very much real to a person who is religiously Christian. Of course
the threat doesn't really exist, but the threat is made and the
person believes it. This is a threat of punishment and does fall
under the definition of authority Rose gives.
We could actually go on with this and remember things like the
Crusades, Salem Witch Trials, ostracization from society, or
other forms of religious violence.
I was unable to confirm if Rose is an atheist. I messaged him on
his website and asked him. His answer was evasive and did not
give a real answer:
Jason,
While what I believe in is far from what
almost anyone calls "God," I don't usually use
the term "atheist" to describe myself, just
because it often implies that one believes that
people are nothing more than complicated
machines, made of dead stuff, resulting by
accident--which I do NOT believe. Sorry that
the answer is so much more complicated than
the question.
Larken
I don't actually know what this answer is supposed to mean.
From what I can gather he has a religion that doesn't involve
there being a god. Due to the fact his answer was not specific
enough to provide me with sufficient information; I'm going to
go on the premise that he is an atheist.
To continue to define what he sees as authority, he continues
with this:
34
“Authority” can be summed up as the right to
rule. It is not merely the ability to forcibly
control others, which to some extent nearly
everyone possesses. It is the supposed moral
right to forcibly control others. What
distinguishes
a
street
gang
from
“government” is how they are perceived by
the people they control the trespasses,
robbery, extortion, assault and murder
committed by common thugs are perceived
by almost everyone as being immoral,
unjustified, and criminal. Their victims may
comply with their demands, but not out of
any feeling of moral obligation to obey,
merely out of fear. If the intended victims of
the street gang thought they could resist
without any danger to themselves, they
would do so, without the slightest feeling of
guilt. They do not perceive the street thug to
be any sort of legitimate, rightful ruler; they
do not imagine him to be “authority.” The
loot the thug collects is not referred to as
“taxes,” and his threats are not called “laws.”
The hypocrisy he is absolutely astounding. This is a man who
believes in capitalism, one of the most authoritarian structures
mankind has ever produced. Rose believes in the non-Aggression
Principal which is an authority because it does come with a
threat of punishment. Libertarians like him talk a lot about
hoarding guns to kill people who would violate the NAP in their
ideal world. They also openly advocate private police forces that
would follow private courts that would carry threats of
punishment. How is this any different than the conception of
government which he says he is against?
35
Rose says that it's not just force, but "the supposed moral right
to forcibly control others." This defines exactly what the NAP is.
It is a moral guideline by which these people live. It's a moral
principal; they literally refer to is as one. The point of it is to
claim that the initiation of force is immoral. (Of course this is
completely hypocritical given that they do advocate another
kind of force.) Even if Rose didn't see it as a moral authority, the
NAP itself still is a moral authority, as it provides a moral guide
by which to conduct interactions between people. It's apparent
now that philosophically, Rose has no idea what he is talking
about.
Rose now goes on to see the authority as a matter of
perception. If people don't see it as a moral authority, then it
isn't one. He uses street gangs as an example. People don't see
the gang as having a moral right, "They do not perceive the street
thug to be any sort of legitimate, rightful ruler; they do not
imagine him to be “authority.”" This is the only difference in his
mind. They both use force, they demand the same obedience
and they both claim to be an authority. The only difference here
for Rose is that people don't view the street gang as being a
"legitimate, rightful ruler". The problem with Rose's claim is that
the gang does see the leadership of it as an authority. The gang
sees the leaders as having a "legitimate, rightful ruler".
If we follow this logic and apply it to Rose himself, we can
conclude that Rose doesn't see the government as an authority.
He doesn't perceive the government as being a "legitimate,
rightful ruler". Since by his own definition of what an authority
is, the government doesn't match it, then his whole book
attacking authority (the government) is meaningless, because it
is not an authority. This means despite having a long convoluted
explanation of what authority is, his explanation is ultimately
self-defeating.
36
What he is doing is trying to make an objective argument about
authority using subjective premises. Meaning he is painting an
objective picture with a subjective brush. This doesn't make any
sense.
We can use this same definition as a way to prove that Rose's
claim of being anti-authority is false. He has stated numerous
times on his website that he follows the NAP, and that society
should be run by the NAP. The NAP for all intents and purposes
is a moral guide by which a person lives.v To make a long
explanation short, it means to not use force against people. This
is now an authority in that it is a guide by which to live. If
someone violates the NAP, libertarians say they are right to use
force to ensure the NAP is followed. They even believe in private
police forces and courts to enforce the NAP on people. If society
runs on this principal they now believed it to be a "legitimate,
rightful ruler". This meets the entire criteria that Rose uses to
define what authority is.
Rose now shows that he does believe in an authority, yet he
claims he rejects authority because it is wrong. He hasn't just
proven his definition of authority to be nonsense; he has proven
himself to be a false anti-authoritarian. We can now conclude
that he does believe in authority. If he was entire honest about
being anti-authoritarian, he would have to reject the NAP
because it is an authority to him.
In truth, what he is really saying is that he doesn't like the
government's authority. He doesn't like what the US
government's policies are, or what it does. He is not actually
speaking out against authority; as can be seen by his
contradictory view. He is in actuality only speaking out against
the US government's authority (and government in general).
This is not a philosophy put together by a man striving to be
free. It is put together by a man (seemingly) "struggling" to not
pay taxes or wear a seatbelt while driving.
37
This book thus far seems little more than whining about having
to follow laws he doesn't like. If you don't like the laws in a
society that's fine, you struggle to change them by whatever
means you feel is necessary to do so. Failing that you do have
the option to leave. Instead of doing that, he has decided to go
ahead and form a ridiculous concept authority and hypocritical,
contradictory perception of freedom from it.
The Government Does Exist
Rose here formulates his own theory as to why government
doesn't exist. This is baffling given the very real material
substance of it. His idea though, is the concept that the
government is just a concept, so therefore it does not exist. This
is another example of those times when he can't tell the
difference between the idea of something and its physical
manifestation. The government does exist; it is made up of all
the people who carry out its function. Every police officer, judge,
civil servant and bureaucrat is the government. This is its
material existence that operates day to do. A government is no
different than a society. It is made up of the aggregate actions of
individuals working according to some kind of plan or social
cohesion. Rose seemingly ignores these people and what they
do and instead only focuses on the authority behind it. The
government is a rule of law, and idea and the actions of
individuals working with them. Without the people working
behind those ideas and laws the government literally doesn't
exist. Those people, who carry out the "will" of the government,
are the government.
I find this need to prove that government doesn't exist a little bit
unnecessary given his already previously stated position on
authority. He has made it clear that if something isn't perceived
to have a moral right to rule over you then it is no longer an
authority. If it no longer is an authority then would it really
matter whether or not it existed? I know he is speaking
38
philosophically when he say it does not exist, but his philosophy
is so convoluted you can't tell when he denying material
existence or a philosophical concept.
So what we have here is the belief by Rose that the government
doesn't exist because it is supposedly only an idea. That idea is
not an authority given his own definition of what authority is,
because he doesn't recognize its moral right to rule. Since he
doesn't seem to count the people who work in government to
be a physical manifestation of it, because it is only an idea, they
don't exist as government either.
From this I can only conclude one to two things: Either the man
is already free in his own mind, or he has not even the basic
understanding of philosophy and has presented an idea that
makes no sense. This is idealism in an extreme. He literally
reduces everything to what he thinks something is. His idea of
what authority is is self-refuting. His definition of what a
government is just doesn't correspond to reality. If Rose was an
experienced philosopher I'd say he's lost his mind. Instead it is
just apparent to us that he has no idea what he is doing.
Enough of my explanation of what he is saying here, allow me to
go more into the explanation of his claim to show how
extremely idealist it is.
These are the primary claims he puts forth in the opening to this
section:
1. Government produces inferior results.
2. The concept itself is irrational and contradictory.
3. It is "a superstition, devoid of any logical or evidentiary
support".
He begins as I stated earlier, without an understanding what
government is and how it exists.
39
In short, government does not exist. It never
has and it never will. The politicians are real,
the soldiers and police who enforce the
politicians’ will are real, the buildings they
inhabit are real, the weapons they wield are
very real, but their supposed “authority” is
not. And without that “authority,” without
the right to do what they do, they are nothing
but a gang of thugs.
He insists that the government is only an idea. He is absolutely
wrong. Government is an idea; the government is also a
materially existing entity. We continue this philosophical theme
of Rose failing to differentiate between concepts and their
physical manifestations. The government is very real; it is made
up of all the people he just listed as not counting because they
believe in the authority. Those people are the authority and the
government. Their aggregate actions make up what the
government is. He is just denying the existence of the
government because he doesn't believe in its right to rule.
Yes, without the authority the police would be a gang of thugs.
In fact I'd argue that even with authority they are still a gang of
thugs.
This is silly idealism once again. If he doesn't believe in their
authority, they don't have it. If they don't have the authority
then they are a gang of thugs. Just because you don't recognize
something, doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. This is a wholly
conscious attempt to determine matter, idealism. We see this
from libertarians all the time.
"That's not real capitalism!" we hear this all the time from them.
This means they refuse recognize the reality of capitalism in
existence. As a result they can deny all of the negative effects of
capitalism. They don't believe that capitalism exists, therefore all
criticisms of it and its real destructive inhuman effects don't
40
exist because of it. If you don't believe its real capitalism, then
the effects of capitalism don't exist. Therefore, by default
without rationality or argument, it must be the effects socialism.
If you ignore the existence of something, then anything that is a
product of it can be dismissed as non-existent as well.
By this same line of thinking we can absolutely refute
libertarianism as well. Libertarianism is only an idea because
people who believe in it don't count as a manifestation of it.
Therefore libertarianism doesn't exist. Larken Rose believes in
the superstition of libertarianism. In reality the libertarian
movement is made up of the aggregate actions of those who
believe in it, just as the government does. If this is his argument
why government doesn't exist, it denies the existence of his own
ideology. He is a libertarian; he rejects government in favour of
the libertarian belief which has the same mode of existence.
Essentially he is self-refuting again in his claim regarding
government.
Now with all this having been said, Rose jumps right into
absolute insanity. Because Rose doesn't believe that the
government has the right to rule, therefore anything the
government does or anything debated in Congress or Parliament
is irrational. All government, debate, voting is all "irrational"
because government is an idea. He doesn't believe in the idea,
so it must be "irrational" to carry on debate, make laws etc. Of
course he doesn't differentiate between the idea of government
and its material existence. He doesn't actually prove that the
government doesn't exist. This whole claim of irrationality
depends on him proving government doesn't exist when it does.
All Rose is saying here is that he doesn't believe in the
government so therefore anyone who disagrees with him is
being irrational. He is just stamping his foot name calling anyone
who doesn't agree with him. His idea here is ridiculously flawed.
41
This is all self-refuting going back to what he said originally. The
authority is real if you agree that it has the right to "rule" over
you. So if I believe that the authority exists, then the
government exists. If the government exists, then all debate is
rational because the premise of government existing is true. If
the government does exist then the actions and debate
concerning it are rational.
The problem can be broken down here to be made simple:
He is wrong. His definition of authority is tremendously flawed
and self-refuting. His definition of government denies reality.
People do believe in the authority, he can't say the authority
isn't real because he defines it as something you believe in. This
belief in authority alone makes the government real, even if you
just ignore the material reality of government existing.
1. He doesn't believe in the authority, therefore it doesn't exist
2. He ignores the reality of the government existing because he
doesn't believe in the idea of government (despite its physical
existence).
3. He claims anyone who disagrees with him is irrational
All he has managed to really say is that he doesn't agree that the
government should have authority, so therefore anyone who
disagrees with him is irrational. No, this position he takes is
irrational.
To attempt to reinforce this supposed irrationality, he makes a
really bad comparison.
To use an analogy, two people could engage
in a useful, rational discussion about whether
nuclear power or hydroelectric dams are the
better way to produce electricity for their
42
town. But if someone suggested that a better
option would be to generate electricity using
magic pixie dust, his comments would be and
should be dismissed as ridiculous, because
real problems cannot be solved by mythical
entities, Yet almost all modem discussion of
societal problems is nothing but an argument
about which type of magic pixie dust will save
humanity.
This comparison is tremendously in false. Rose's whole premise
is that the government is fictional. However in this comparison
the solution offered is being called fictional. He is confusing the
solutions for the decision makers. The two people are like the
government in that they are making a decision and they are
people who physically exist. This was just horrible.
Rose Rationalizes His Irrational View
In a brilliant piece of irony that one could also consider to be a
troll post, Rose literally describes himself when attacking other
people for what he himself is doing. He has a very short section
called "Attempting to Rationalize the Irrational" where he claims
that people who disagree with him are irrational. His argument
is reducible to this: I say that authority doesn't exist; therefore
anyone who disagrees with me is irrational. Any argument
against what I claim is therefore rationalizing the irrational. This
is essentially it when we look at what he has said so far.
Authority doesn't exist because he can't differentiate between
an idea and its physical manifestation (the government). Anyone
who attempts to argue against his position is therefore
irrational. There is no investigation into whether or not that
counter-argument is right or wrong; it MUST be irrational
because of his false a priori belief.
What Rose is doing here is irrational. He declares an a priori
position and from that everything else is automatically
43
determined. This in his mind is a rationalization for ignoring
anything that challenges his belief. Nothing is allowed to
challenge his belief, which is akin to that of a religious mindset.
The irony here is that he is being completely irrational.
Yes, Consent is Real
Rose as libertarians do, have an obsession with "proving"
consent to living in society doesn't exist. They are of the opinion
that if you literally don't sign contract, then you never gave
consent to abide by societies' laws. Of course this too is built on
a total pile of altering of reality to fit their beliefs. They too like
Rose create an extremely perverse idea of what consent is to
justify rejecting government, but not all the forms of coercion.
This is a really typical libertarian complaint.
Like all libertarians, when beginning an argument over consent,
he jumps instantly to comparing modern contract society to
slavery. Every single one of them makes this false comparison
even though they are completely different things. They do this
because they believe that people having a government is
slavery. This shows a tremendous lack of knowledge of the
development of economic relations. This is driven by a
sometimes completely psychotic neurosis where they think any
cooperation between people, and a corresponding "authority"
to carry that out is automatically slavery. This kind of ultra
freedom mindset stems from an obvious White upper middle
class privilege. This usually flairs up when they take a wage
labour job because it's the only job available. It's a crybaby
phenomenon that appears when one of them isn't a winner in
"capitalism". It also manifests itself when the slightest
something interferes with their extremist view of freedom and
individualism. Basically it happens when their view of reality
(detached from reality) doesn't actually exist in real life.
This is the ridiculous hyperbole that is common place among
libertarians.
44
To somehow "prove" that people never give consent for the
government to rule, he makes just downright stupid
comparisons. He doesn't actually show how you're forced in
society; he just gives supposed examples of the same thing.
There is nothing wrong with giving examples to assist in
explaining an idea. The problem is that it's all he uses without
accompanying it with an argument or an actual demonstration.
Much of what he says is simply fallacious. It starts from the
premise that government is forcing you which he doesn't prove.
Therefore anything that comes from the government must be
force. Then, because he starts from this a priori, he comes up
with absurd statements like this:
Some will claim that a majority; or the people
as a whole, have given their consent to be
ruled, even if many individuals have not. But
such an argument turns the concept of
consent on its head. No one, individually or as
a group, can give consent for something to be
done to someone else. That is simply not
what “consent” means. It defies logic to say,
“I give my consent for you to be robbed.” Yet
that is the basis of the cult of “democracy”:
the notion that a majority can give consent
on behalf of a minority, That is not “consent
of the governed”; it is forcible control of the
governed, with the “consent” of a third party.
Here Rose completely misrepresents how the government
works. Like his argumentation for everything else, he just
changes the definition of what something is, misrepresent how
it works, in order for his argument to work. America, like pretty
much all countries operate on a majority vote. If that majority
chooses a certain path, or choose someone that sets down a
certain path, it is a majority rule. Rose acknowledges this but
45
refuses to accept it as a legitimate functioning. His words are
instead that because he wasn't among the majority opinion (or
vote) then what is carried out (or voted in) is now invalid. Just
because his side didn't win, this does not invalidate the vote. To
turn his argument on its head, anything he votes for is therefore
invalidated because someone else didn't vote for it. By doing
this he invalidates his own vote, and essentially, he makes the
argument that he shouldn't be allowed to vote because it would
be attempting force on people, because they didn't consent to
it.
(In fact, on Rose's blog he does say that democracy is a
"ritualistic farce". To his credit he does apply the same to
himself. This does not however negate the fact that he rejects it
because his vote [or wants] wouldn't win.)
What he does is compare his vote not being in the majority to
being robbed at gun point. This is tremendously dishonest as
essentially it amounts to foot stamping because what he wants
didn't make it into official policy. What he's really saying is,
"Democracy didn't get me what I want, so therefore democracy
doesn't work." This is a stance that libertarians take, from Ayn
Rand to Ron Paul. Democracy is fascism because I didn't get
what I want. That is not how democracy works; it runs by a
majority rule, carrying out the majority opinion. It does not work
by carrying out the wants of every single person. This is in reality
a position of, "everything doesn't revolve around me so that I
get whatever I want, so therefore it isn't free". Libertarians have
a very hard time understanding that other people in the world
exist and that they are allowed to disagree with them.
His childishness comes shining through when he calls people
who disagree with him cultists". He has presented a particular
view of what democracy is. His view is absolutely incorrect and
we can demonstrate clearly that he is correct. Because people
don't agree with him, he calls them cultists. People support the
46
idea of democracy, which he is against, so therefore they are
called a cult.
A cult in reality is where people are of one mindset and blindly
believe something and someone. By contrast the American
political landscape is filled with people with differing ideas and
competition ideologies. Rose simply pretends this doesn't exist
and claims that since people support a majority vote (on
different ideas) it must therefore be a cult. Either he doesn't
know what the word cult means, or he has completely changed
the definition of the word to suit his ignorant world outlook. My
guess is that he's changed it to mean anyone who believes
something different than him. I am of course, going by his own
writings in coming to that conclusion.
As a Marxist I would actually argue something much better than
this system of "representative democracy". I would argue that it
is not a democracy due to the way it actually operates. I would
not turn around and say that democracy is fascism because me,
me, me, mine, mine, mine.
While we're on this subject, I'd like to briefly go into what
libertarians advocate in the place of democracy. They believe in
what they call "voting with your dollars". The notion is simply
ridiculous from both the view of democracy and the view of
libertarians against democracy. The idea is that by the purchases
we make will influence the economy and thusly that is somehow
freedom. Exactly how is it democratic that a one person gets
million or billions of votes because they're rich, while another
person gets next to none because they're poor? The poor would
have literally no say because their economic power would not be
great enough to influence anything. The rich as a minority would
have the power to dictate everything through the market, which
is considerable power. This means people like Rose would never
have consented to it what they did or its effects. It's an entirely
self-defeating position.
47
Regardless of this view he has of democracy there is consent in
this system that Rose denies exists. He does this by presenting
us with hidden assumptions, without which his argument
doesn't work. These assumptions are false, so indeed his
argument doesn't work. People do consent, every time a person
votes they are consenting to the government that is formed.
Even if the one they don't agree with what that government is,
or who was elected. They willingly freely participated in the
process. Rose on the other hand makes the assumption that if
you didn't vote for the person who won, or agreed with the plan
(or policy) that was implemented, then therefore you didn't
consent. People consented to the process that came to that
policy or election. This is a false assumption by Rose.
In addition to this, he also makes the assumption that one is
forced into participating in this system. No one forces you to
vote, you can choose not to. Yes, I already know what the
libertarian reaction to this will be. They live in the country and
are affected by the policies that are carried out by that process
even if they don't vote. This is true; however they do have a
choice. They either participate in that system to change it, or
they leave the country. No one can force you into participating
because you can leave. The assumption made here by Rose and
other libertarians is that you are forced into participating. This is
not true; they have the choice of leaving. This fraudulent nature
of this argument of consent is: wanting all the benefits of living
in United States without having to contribute anything for those
benefits. Again we return to the libertarian idea of taking with
having to give anything.
In truth, the libertarian position on democracy is that if it
doesn't work out in their personal favour then it is invalid. We
can see this by the actions of libertarians in office. When a vote
or policy comes out in their favour, they support it as though it
were legitimate. If they believe that a majority vote or
democracy is invalid, then they should be decrying it as going
48
against the will of a minority. Libertarians in this regard are
completely hypocritical and inherently fascist by their own
definition.
The libertarian view is essentially this: if democracy doesn't
produce what they want, then democracy is fascism. This is
because, in their minds, fascism is not getting what they want
against their will. It is in truth, complete childishness.
There are some more arguments made by Rose, and I'll deal
with them here:
The believers in “government” never explain
how it is that a few politicians could have
acquired the right to unilaterally claim
exclusive ownership of thousands of square
miles of land, where other people were
already living, as their territory, to rule and
exploit as they see fit. It would be no different
from a lunatic saying, “I hereby declare North
America to be my rightful domain, so anyone
living here has to do whatever I say, If you
don’t like it, you can leave.”
There is also a practical problem with the
“obey or get out” attitude, which is that
getting out would only relocate the individual
to some other giant slave plantation, a
different “country.” The end result is that
everyone on earth is a slave, with the only
choice being which master to live under. This
completely rules out actual freedom. More to
the point that is not what “consent” means.
Well actually we do explain how. Although I don't like the US
government, I consider it to be a terrible and global terrorist
organization, I do know, as well as many others, how it came
49
have the right to rule. I cannot think of any person who supports
the idea of government not knowing where the right to rule
comes from. It has the right every time people vote, every time
the people participate in the democratic system. People
recognizing its authority (the real definition, not Roses') gives it
the right to. Again we return to the old position of, if Rose
doesn't acknowledge the authority, then it doesn't have the
right. If everyone else does, it doesn't matter because he didn't.
It's just the same old case of society didn't run it by him first so
therefore it's not legitimate.
In terms of where the authority of the US government came
from, we need only look into the birth of the nation itself.
Perhaps Rose remembers the period called the Revolutionary
War. The people of colony of America fought a war against the
British government to obtain their independence and establish
their own government. The people literally fought and died to
have their own government. That is where some of its right to
rule comes from. From here I could go full right wing and start
claiming that Rose wants to disgrace and spit upon all those who
sacrificed their lives to have freedom from the British.
Next he takes on the "love it or leave it" attitude. In reality it's
not that simple. Theoretically you have the opportunity to
change the society by voting or running for office yourself, so it's
not as simple as "obey or get out" as Rose would have you
believe. Leaving is a legitimate choice, it is something you can
and do have the right to. Now, Rose says it's not a choice
because you have to end up in a country somewhere and all
those governments also don't have a right to rule. Just because
no country produces exactly what he wants doesn't mean that
the choice doesn't exist. There is no "over government" which
dictates to all countries what kind of government they are
allowed to have. The fact is, what he wants isn't supported by
people. It's a combination of values that just don't exist. Other
countries are not obligated to provide him and libertarians with
50
what they want. Again we see the self-entitlement of
libertarians showing its head.
There is another problem with his complaint here. There is
supposedly no choice for him because wherever he could go
there is an "illegitimate government" ruling over people. The
problem is that these countries consent to having those
governments there as well. We've already seen that because
Rose doesn't agree to there being a government, government
shouldn't exist. The problem is that other countries populations
do want governments. Just because he doesn't want them there,
doesn't mean they shouldn't. He's complaining that he doesn't
have a non-state country to go to. Well these other countries
don't exist to provide him with an alternative.
All Rose is really saying is that he shouldn't have to leave
because he was born an American. He doesn't agree with the of
the majority population, doesn't want to go along with it,
doesn't want to engage in changing it, so therefore his only
option is to leave. He thinks he shouldn't have to because he
was born there.
Even with all of this, the claim that there isn't something along
the lines of his "philosophy" isn't true. There is always the
libertarian paradise of Somalia. There's no terrible evil
government telling people how much mercury in the drinking
water is too much. Most of Somalia doesn't have a government
ruling it so he's free to go there. But he and other libertarians
don't want to. They want all the advantages of First World
privilege and infrastructure, but not pay for it.
Rose's Myth of The Government as a Class
In a brief moment Rose starts to make some sense via getting
one little thing right. He mentions class with regards to the
government. So for a brief movement we have a glimmer of
hope that he has some idea of what he is talking about and will
51
in some way acknowledge reality and take into consideration
the economic system that exists in the country. However he
then does a complete 180 and claims that the government itself
is a class. This is absolutely incorrect; again this is placing the
status of sentient entity onto the government as though it were
a being onto itself. He completely ignores the fact that the
government works for people. Who those people are is a matter
of investigation; it is true that the government does not
represent the people. That is absolutely true, even Rose
acknowledges it.
What he does do, like all libertarians do, is completely remove
class analysis from society and instead insist that government is
the problem. To him there is no influence by the economic
system upon the government. It is as if it exists inside a vacuum
and there are no other forces at play in society. This is very
common for libertarians and does make up the majority of their
arguments on everything. For example they'll take supply and
demand, then assert that it works a certain way without taking
into account things that happen in the real world that affect it.
Form this they arrogantly declare that the market is a perfect
regulator. This is exactly what Rose and libertarians do with the
state. They just attribute everything to it and ignore the context
in which it exists that would affect and even determine its
operation.
They do this by simply pretending class doesn't exist. They
acknowledge that there are rich and poor, they acknowledged
that there are classes. Despite that, when it comes to analyzing
things they leave the reality of class out and pretend it doesn't
exist. The government serves the interests of the capitalist class.
There can be no doubt about this. The bailouts that gave free
money to the banks were an act to preserve the capitalist class.
Without that money going to them, the entire capitalist system
would have come to an end. This FACT is utterly ignored by
libertarians; it is also completely ignored by people who support
52
capitalism as a system. They ignorantly call it corruption that is
not inherent to the system itself. No, this is how the system
functions. It is a capitalist system, it exists to strengthen and
enforce the power of the capitalist class.
Due to this blithering ignorance, he attributes the status of class
to the state itself. He (like all libertarians) literally makes the old
"guns kill people fallacy". A gun is a perfect symbol for the state.
The problem with people like Rose is that they think that the gun
is alive and takes its own actions from its own conscious
thought. No it most certainly does not. The state is a tool, just
like a gun, that is wielded by someone. In capitalism that gun is
wielded by the capitalist class. Rose literally just pretends this
doesn't exist and attacks the gun. This is thoroughly ignorant,
and aptly demonstrates how little in the way of economics and
society he actually knows.
A perfect demonstration of this is this passage where Rose looks
class reality right in the face, then turns his head side ways so
that he deliberately sees something different:
In the real world, so-called “representative
governments” are constantly doing things
their subjects do not want them to do:
increasing
“taxes,”
engaging
in
warmongering, selling off power and
influence to whoever gives them the most
money, and so on. Every taxpayer can easily
think of examples of things funded with his
mane) that he objects to, whether it be
handouts to huge corporations, handouts to
certain individuals, government actions that
infringe on individual rights, or just the
overall
wasteful,
corrupt,
inefficient
bureaucratic machine of “government.”
[Bolding is mine]
53
This paragraph aptly demonstrates the class nature of the
government. It is not "selling off" influence; there is only one
class that exerts influence. The "buying off" of politicians by the
capitalist class is how bourgeois (representative) democracy
works. Capitalists pay for the campaigns of politicians in order to
carry out their interests. The people don't have the money to
pay out what the capitalists do because the capitalists own the
wealth in society. They own the means of production which the
worker is employed in. They own the wealth that is generated by
the worker and uses it to pay his oppression. In capitalism, due
to the structure of the economic system, workers can never
influence politicians in any way that can compete with the
capitalist class. Does Rose not notice that it's only millionaires,
billionaires and companies that donate these exorbitant
amounts of money to politicians? No, he just ignores this, and
screams that government is evil. He has no ability whatsoever to
critically look at society. Like all libertarians he simply just sees
the government in isolation as though it was an invading force
corrupting society and refuses to do any analysis.
Denying the class character of everything is the very epitome of
libertarians thought. Their belief is that capitalism can't do
anything wrong. Any bad thing that happens must be the result
of something outside the system itself. It must be the
government, as supposedly government is separate from
capitalism. It must be the work of "communist" agitators causing
problems in society. Nothing demonstrates the complete
ignorance and downright stupidity of libertarianism.
In this previous passage we also see that he blames wars on the
government. Once again we see that he doesn't know what he's
talking about. War isn't the result of the government; it is the
result of competing interests. In Marxism we call this the
phenomenon of contradiction. Opposing forces in society, the
world, the universe, whatever, are constantly pushing against
each other. Capitalism is no different, and this should be
54
blatantly obvious to anyone who understands even the most
basic aspects of it: competition. Iraq held the valuable resource
oil. Saddam Hussein decided that he was going to begin selling
oil in Euros instead of US dollars. This was going to make Iraq
much wealthier and make oil more expensive for Americans as
they would now have to purchase Euros in order to purchase oil.
This caused an increase in price which cut into profits. The
interests of Iraq (the profit motive) directly contradicted the
interests of American (and British) companies (their profit
motive).
This switch to the Euro gave an economic advantage to the
European Union countries due to the fact they use the currency.
Before, they had to purchase US dollars in order to obtain oil
from Iraq. This is why most of the European countries refused to
go along with the war and opposed it. The UK was a high profile
supporter of the war and did not use the Euro. They did know
however, that if they assisted in the destruction of Iraq they
would get preferential treatment when it came to doling out the
oil. It was in their rational economic interest to participate in,
what was essentially, the genocide of Iraq.
We can see the same kind of capitalist motive behind the
invasion of Afghanistan. The events of 9/11 (whether or not you
believe the official story) were a justification for invading the
country. Afghanistan has one of the largest untapped potential
for mining. There are tons of deposits of minerals that have not
been mined out. The government of Afghanistan was not
interested in allowing foreign companies come in en masse and
exploit those resources. The United States ruling class (the
capitalist class) saw the opportunity to justify an invasion and
took it. This is also why, Canada, a country that traditionally
doesn't involve itself in such actions also participated. Canada is
huge for international mining and is the worst human rights
abuser when it comes to it.
55
These were not the actions of "government"; these were the
actions of the capitalist class using government to carry out its
interests.
Representative Democracy: Who Owns Who?
Like all libertarians he calls upon the age old claim that
"representative government" is inherently flawed because
everyone isn't going to want the same thing. Different people
want the government to do different things. The problem in his
view and those of libertarians is that the government will be
going against the will of at least some people. In addition, he
believes that even if the government did what a majority of the
population wanted it to do; it would not be serving the people
as a whole. However he adds, the government has never done
what the majority of its "subjects" wants. It will always "be
forcibly victimizing smaller groups on behalf of larger groups".
The most immediate error he's made here is the claim that the
government has never carried out the will of the majority. This
can easily be debunked by looking no further than the example
of American entry into WW2 after Pearl Harbour. A majority of
the population wanted entry, thus they received it. Of course
there were other factors that went into the decision, the point
remains, the majority wanted it and the government carried it
out. So here he is outright lying.
In dealing with this concept of representative democracy, Rose
clearly doesn't understand the obvious difference between
representation and absolute consensus. His complaint that
representative government is wrong because it can't act with
absolute consensus is ridiculous when we consider that it was
never the intention of representative government.
Representative government exists because a government can't
carry out the will of all people. Rose intentionally misleads the
reader on the purpose and origin of representative democracy in
order to attack it. Either this or he has no idea what he is talking
56
about. This is on par with complaining that the Bolsheviks
confiscated private property, of course they did, and they never
intended to do anything else.
People don't have consensus that is why a representative is
elected to carry out (at least in theory) the interests of the group
that person represents. At no point is there ever an intention to
have consensus. They can only make one choice; the idea is that
choice will be as close to the majority as possible. This is exactly
what was put forward by the Founding Fathers, this is the
general idea they advocated. They created the representative
democracy in America and set up a relative system of checks and
balances. If this is the case, then Rose must admit before his
audience that he thinks the Founding Fathers were evil fascist
statists.
Rose advocates something that inherently can't exist. He's
essentially saying that you either have a full consensus, or you
have a free-for-all where everyone does what they want. In
reality the second chose leads to total anarchy as the freedoms
of individuals clash with one another. The reason the Founding
Fathers (and others) instituted the government was to mediate
these instances. People with economic or military-like power
were forcing their will on other people violating their
"inalienable rights". Recognizing this problem as all rational
societies do, they created a system of laws and regulations to
have order and commonsense. Most importantly to establish a
general guideline of freedoms and rights that cause as little
friction between individuals as possible. Rose is, in the end, just
whining because his utopian idea of ultimate personal freedom
doesn't, and could never exist in real life. This puts his desire on
about the level of a fourteen year old who doesn't want to do
their home work.
57
Suck it up libertarians, your utopian idea of absolute freedom
doesn't and cannot exist because freedoms are ultimately
contradictory.
Now, in fairness to libertarians, some have general outlines of
certain things you're not allowed to do. Without a government,
you have to have some mechanism of force to en-force those
guidelines. These almost always include private police and
private courts. Some advocate a minimal state, where these two
functions still exist. If this is the case, where it pretty much
always is, then they've completely invalidated their own
ideology. The courts and police are coercive mechanisms, they
are force. If the whole point of being a libertarian (or wrongly
calling yourself Anarchist in this case) is to eliminate authority
and force, they've just contradicted themselves as they advocate
the continued existence of it. This ideology is ultimately selfdefeating and self refuting.
The fact of his ignorance (or dishonesty) surrounding the
creation of states, their laws and the role of politicians in that
system are laid much more bare in this following passage:
"The belief that politicians own everything is
demonstrated even more dramatically in the
concept of immigration “laws.” The idea that
a human being needs permission from
politicians to set foot anywhere in an entire
country – the notion that it can be a “crime”
for someone to step across an invisible line
between one authoritarian jurisdiction into
another – implies that the entire country is
the property of the ruling class. If a citizen is
not allowed to hire an “illegal alien,” is not
allowed to trade with him, is not even
allowed to invite an “illegal” into his own
58
home, then that individual citizen owns
nothing, and the politicians own everything."
In this passage Rose comes close to leaving the realm of being
mistaken to the realm of delusional. Politicians do not own
anything; they are bureaucrats who work on the behalf of
others. (Who they work for is a matter I will deal with in a few
moments; the point is that they are not the owners of the
system). We again return to the incorrect libertarian belief that
the government is an entity onto itself with its own
consciousness. This is not true, the government is controlled by
other forces in society, the government is not a person, but a
representative of a group, or class of people. Rose must stand
on the foundation that the government is its own being that
holds absolute power and is not beholden to anyone.
Let me be clear, the government is NOT a living breathing
conscious entity that exists and operates of its own will.
The reality is that politicians are owned by particular interests
among the capitalist class. Everyone can pretty much agree that
the government doesn't really serve the people. It's a nice
slogan, but it doesn't have the actions to back up the words.
There is one thing we can all see quite clearly, the interests of
the capitalist class are carried out quite well. When big business
(or business in general) needs something the government will
pretty much stop everything in order to help them.
The bank bailouts are an exceptional example of this. Trillions of
taxpayer dollars were used to literally bailout the financial
aristocracy, and by extension the capitalist system. If the banks
had failed, gone under, become completely insolvent; the entire
capitalist system would have come to an end. This goes for
productive capitalists as well, those who are outside finance
who produce physical commodities. If the financial system had
come to an end, their production would have ended as well. The
US government didn't bailout the banks so much as they bailed
59
out the global capitalist system. There is no doubt, given the
reach and holdings of US banks (but by no means unique to US
banks) that their collapse would have caused the collapse of the
entire world capitalist order. If you doubt this, just look at the
global recession and crisis in Southern Europe which began from
US bank failures.
(Let me be clear, if you support capitalism, you must then
support bank bailouts. If not, there would have been a total
destruction of capitalism. To oppose them is to support the
destruction of capitalism.)
Politicians do not own the government; they operate the
government at the behest of certain interests. Politicians
themselves are owned by the capitalist class who use their
power as the owners of capital to exert control. (Yes, this is
capitalism, capital has the power, ignoring this is to deny reality.)
Whenever we hear about a scandal involving a politician, what
do we hear? We hear about how he/she took money from a
business man (capitalist) and went on to pervert a decision or
make an action in favour of the person who gave them the
money. Even expanding this a little, we've seen rich people buy
their way out of trouble. These people can do it because they
have the money, because they're capitalists (owning the means
of production, or finance capital). This is a power exclusive to
the capitalist class.
The only exception would be when a politician abuses his power
to save a personal friend. This however, does nothing to
determine where he gets his power from, or who controls him,
or who he represents. It is merely a perk of being that
representative of the capitalist class in the government.
It is clear from this superficial observation that the capitalist
class owns the politicians. What I think is important to
demonstrate here is how they own them. A politician runs for
office, meaning he goes out into the public and lies to you about
60
why you should support him. The one thing a politician needs
more than anything else is money. No politician can exist
without serious financial backing. This is particularly true if they
run for President. Serious money requires people with serious
money. Who owns the wealth? Well the capitalist class does.
They fund both sides of the election. Actually they pretty much
fund the entire election.
vi
Obama (D)
Romney (R)
1 University
of California
2 Microsoft
Corp
3 Google Inc
$1,212,245
4 US
Government
5 Harvard
University
$728,647
$814,625
$801,770
$668,368
1 Goldman
Sachs
2 Bank of
America
3 Morgan
Stanley
4 JPMorgan
Chase & Co
5 Wells Fargo
$1,033,204
$1,013,402
$911,305
$834,096
$677,076
The 2012 US Presidential election is a rare time when finance
heavily favoured one candidate over another. Usually large
financial institutions fund both sides fairly evenly. The reason
they do this is so they can have a good control over whoever
wins the election. Without big business - (primarily finance
capital because they have so much wealth) these elections
would be drastically reduced, or even impossible given the right
circumstances. This is why the system always works out in
favour of the capitalist class, particularly the owners of finance
capital.
The real power in society is capital. Whoever owns capital has
the power. This is why we call it capitalism.
61
In the view of Rose this is simply not true. These institutions
simply hand over vast amounts of wealth to allow Obama (or
Romney) to do whatever they want. I couldn't imagine any
political idea to be more ridiculous. It is tantamount to saying
these institutions don't care what politicians do with their
money. It also deliberately ignores the actions that the
government has taken in the preservation and servitude of
capitalism.
Let us look at this some more. When we look we can also see an
overlap of the capitalist class and politicians. Last year it was
reported that nearly half of all Congress members were
millionairesvii. Members of the capitalist class have no trouble
getting into the governmental institutions of power to serve
their own class' interest.
Where does Rose get the idea that there is no class context to
the state? He shuts his eyes and plugs his ears to the reality that
the functioning of the state he stands against is all for the
benefit of the capitalist class. This would be a criticism of
capitalism, which he will not do. Absolutely nothing could show
more starkly the dishonest nature of his beliefs and the
misinformation he spreads.
As Rose continues he clearly demonstrates he has no idea why
immigration laws exist. I would agree with him that no one
should be considered an "illegal alien". Especially considering
that the United States of America and Americans, like Rose, are
standing on stolen land. That land is stolen from the Native
Americans and Mexicans. As much as people like Rose talk about
owning their own property and land, they deliberately ignore
the fact they are on stolen property. The entire country of
America and its citizens are on stolen land. Rose is no exception;
he is a thief as well. Libertarians like him talk all about how
people came to America to get away from the King of England
and the repressive Church. They talk about how they grabbed
62
some land and we self-made men who built themselves up. They
deliberately ignore this fact, they ignore that they stand on and
benefit from the greatest act of initiating force ever. The
genocide of a 100 million people was carried out for the sake of
private property. Many libertarians like Rose, literally deny this
genocide. Many of them are genocide deniers.
Returning to the issue of immigration, yes those boarders are
drawn by the ruling class. The capitalist class, the one that he
denies has power. The reality is those boarders distinguish the
lines between jurisdictions of different capitalist classes.
Different sets of capitalists, not just governments decide where
those lines are.
So if Rose doesn't believe that the state operates at the benefit
of the capitalist class, (i.e. no class character to the state,) then
why do they have boarders? What is the point of drawing those
lines on a map if they don't mean anything? He doesn't give an
explanation as to why they do it. You could assume that the
state wants control of the resources. Yet the state doesn't profit
from them, the capitalist class does. So we're left with one of
two conclusions: either the state does it for no reason, or the
state does it for the benefit of some group in the country, the
capitalist class.
When looking at why the boarders are drawn, this is an
important question to ask. Rose does not do this; he reduces the
argument of boarders entirely down to the issue of immigration.
Even then he gives no explanation as to why the state would
make certain immigration illegal. He once again lays such actions
at the feet of the state and provides no reason why it would take
them. He completely removes all analysis from his view, and
instead makes a half-ass moral argument. A completely
hypocritical one considering he advocates the same thing
through a non-governmental force.
63
Despite the assumption of Rose, there is a reason why some
immigration is illegal. Capital in this age of imperialism needs at
least two different pools of workers. Higher income First World
workers like Americans to buy things, and a poorer group of
workers to make things, commonly referred to as the Third
World. If the opportunity is present, workers will move from
Mexico to the US where the living standard is higher and the
wages are higher.
This migration of labour would unbalance the imperialist order
of cheap labour and expensive labour. Given the function of the
extraction of surplus value, there must be a cheaper pool of
labour to create the value that the First World worker
purchases. (The explanation for this is much more in depth, but
it is beyond the scope of this book.) The free mobility of labour is
detrimental to the imperialist capitalist order. This is why only a
certain amount of people are allowed to immigrate. It is to
maintain control over the supply of labour.
Interestingly, many capitalists, particularly agricultural land
owners have a vested interest in keeping some workers illegal.
Harvesting crops is a very expensive part of farming process. It is
extremely expensive to pay First World workers minimum wage
to do the job. It is far more cost effective to have illegal workers
making a quarter as much money doing the same job. The
agricultural land owner has a profit motive interest in keeping
that labour illegal.
Rose refuses to investigate why the government does things.
Instead he merely points with a finger and decries the actions as
immoral. In doing this he fails to understand the system he lives
in, thus has no ability to understand why anything happens.
No worker should be illegal. It is only capitalism that requires
certain workers be so.
*
64
*
*
From this simple look at what Rose is saying, it's clear to us that
he has no idea how society works. He, like all libertarians, bases
their ideology upon the denial of class reality. He truly belies
that the government is a living entity with its own will and
consciousness. The government to him, and those like him, is an
evil boogeyman who stands with its foot on his neck.
His complaints against the government are on the level of
childish bluster. What has he really said in this book in terms of
what is unfair? That he has to pay taxes? That there are
regulations on certain industries? That his "friends" can't hire
Mexican illegal immigrants? He likens having an elected official
to having someone represent a burglar breaking into your home
and stealing things. This is on a childish level comparable to a
fourteen year old calling their teacher a Nazi for assigning them
homework.
65
i
Damn the Torpedoes!, http://www.larkenrose.com/blog/2236.html
Longerich, Peter (2012). Heinrich Himmler: A Life. Oxford; New York: Oxford
University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-959232-6.
ii
Gerwarth, Robert (2011). Hitler's Hangman: The Life of Heydrich. New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-11575-8.
http://www.criticalpast.com/video/65675049037_Buchenwald-concentrationcamp_shrunken-head_trench-feet_German-civilians
iii
Some 65 percent of Americans say that religion is important in their daily lives compared
to just 17 percent of Swedes, 19 percent of Danes, and 24 percent of Japanese. How
Religious Are Americans, Psychology Today,
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-human-beast/201206/how-religious-areamericans-really
iv
The non-aggression principle (NAP)—also called the non-aggression axiom, the zero
aggression principle (ZAP), the anti-coercion principle, or the non-initiation of force—is a
moral stance which asserts that aggression is inherently illegitimate. NAP and property
rights are closely linked, since what aggression is depends on what a person's rights are.
Aggression, for the purposes of NAP, is defined as the initiation or threatening of violence
against a person or legitimately-owned property of another. Specifically, any unsolicited
actions of others that physically affect an individual’s property or person, no matter if the
result of those actions is damaging, beneficial, or neutral to the owner, are considered
violent or aggressive when they are against the owner's free will and interfere with his right
to self-determination and the principle of self-ownership.
v
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-aggression_principle
vi
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres12/
vii
http://www.startribune.com/politics/statelocal/219127451.html
66