Sunday, March 15, 2009
alright, there was an idea once, that was pushed to the backburner due to an aversion to political rhetoric. we've given it time to simmer, i think its time to bring it back and see what new light we can shed on it.
i'm not a big jefferson history guy, but i know stuff. i know enough. he and i share the same basic philosophies. in today's world, i believe he would slant libertarian and be a non-believer, if not an outright atheist. anyways, i am not sure where i am going with that, besides saying i am jeffersonian.
oh yeah, the idea. ryan and i were trying to find a way to fuse libertarianism with a more liberal spirit. ryan and i also share a lot of the same principles, i believe. we have developed a less-biased outlook towards things, which leads us to seemingly irreconcilable dichotomies. it is amazing how much that word comes up in our posts. we try to be rational, without letting our base emotions take control of our actions. one thing that bothers me, and based on our near simultaneous arrival at certain ideas (his golden nuggets, shined up by me) i think ryan might agree is the complete acceptance and justification of greed in people's lives. it is just something that doesn't override our ability to look at things objectively. we can look beyond ourselves, i guess, and see that we are merely parts of a larger whole, so extracting unnecessary wealth at the expense of other people or the system at a whole will ultimately be detrimental to ourselves as well. so, i've been trying to find a term for the form of libertarianism that i can rationalize and support. the best i've come up with is collaborative libertarianism.
but first off, some things would need to change for it to be viable. one of the main driving forces of libertarianism will always be, in my mind, individual accomplishment. that is probably the single most attractive tenet that draws me. individuality and personal achievement are huge parts of who i am and what motivates me. that is why i will never fully be able to support a liberal agenda or socialist ideas. in a sense, it punishes these things. it is an entirely different sort of greed than that which turns me off of libertarianism, but it is greed none the less. anyways, we need to build an environment that encourages the best out of everyone. blanket ideals will not achieve this. i mean, i can't find any way to bring multi-nationalism and hardcore federalist policies in line with a truly open collaboration between individuals. it is going to take a radical scaling back of society. i mean, not so much a scaling back, as in a return to people working on the scale of communities and neighborhoods instead of nations and continents. rules and ideas scaled to meet the needs of the people directly effected, instead of one set of standardized edicts to dictate what is best for everyone, everywhere. i guess what i am thinking is more of a return to states and city-states that are allowed to run themselves, instead of faceless, bloated committees and departments. lets take the training wheels off and let things roll.
let the people exert effort for their own benefit instead of someone elses. give people the freedom to utilize their passion and ideas easily, without undue hindrance from government. give people the privacy and security they need to let their minds work without fear of unseen retribution. we can absorb a little more anarchy. we have flexible, adaptable minds with highly developed problem solving abilities that are being wasted. roll everything back. stop the morass. simplify, and see what grows. just give us a chance to do something, because right now it seems like it is way too easy to get shoehorned into a little existence that sustains itself (barely) without effort, but also without reward or satisfaction. and so, we are all marginalized, and i still don't know how to break away from that.
i'm not a big jefferson history guy, but i know stuff. i know enough. he and i share the same basic philosophies. in today's world, i believe he would slant libertarian and be a non-believer, if not an outright atheist. anyways, i am not sure where i am going with that, besides saying i am jeffersonian.
oh yeah, the idea. ryan and i were trying to find a way to fuse libertarianism with a more liberal spirit. ryan and i also share a lot of the same principles, i believe. we have developed a less-biased outlook towards things, which leads us to seemingly irreconcilable dichotomies. it is amazing how much that word comes up in our posts. we try to be rational, without letting our base emotions take control of our actions. one thing that bothers me, and based on our near simultaneous arrival at certain ideas (his golden nuggets, shined up by me) i think ryan might agree is the complete acceptance and justification of greed in people's lives. it is just something that doesn't override our ability to look at things objectively. we can look beyond ourselves, i guess, and see that we are merely parts of a larger whole, so extracting unnecessary wealth at the expense of other people or the system at a whole will ultimately be detrimental to ourselves as well. so, i've been trying to find a term for the form of libertarianism that i can rationalize and support. the best i've come up with is collaborative libertarianism.
but first off, some things would need to change for it to be viable. one of the main driving forces of libertarianism will always be, in my mind, individual accomplishment. that is probably the single most attractive tenet that draws me. individuality and personal achievement are huge parts of who i am and what motivates me. that is why i will never fully be able to support a liberal agenda or socialist ideas. in a sense, it punishes these things. it is an entirely different sort of greed than that which turns me off of libertarianism, but it is greed none the less. anyways, we need to build an environment that encourages the best out of everyone. blanket ideals will not achieve this. i mean, i can't find any way to bring multi-nationalism and hardcore federalist policies in line with a truly open collaboration between individuals. it is going to take a radical scaling back of society. i mean, not so much a scaling back, as in a return to people working on the scale of communities and neighborhoods instead of nations and continents. rules and ideas scaled to meet the needs of the people directly effected, instead of one set of standardized edicts to dictate what is best for everyone, everywhere. i guess what i am thinking is more of a return to states and city-states that are allowed to run themselves, instead of faceless, bloated committees and departments. lets take the training wheels off and let things roll.
let the people exert effort for their own benefit instead of someone elses. give people the freedom to utilize their passion and ideas easily, without undue hindrance from government. give people the privacy and security they need to let their minds work without fear of unseen retribution. we can absorb a little more anarchy. we have flexible, adaptable minds with highly developed problem solving abilities that are being wasted. roll everything back. stop the morass. simplify, and see what grows. just give us a chance to do something, because right now it seems like it is way too easy to get shoehorned into a little existence that sustains itself (barely) without effort, but also without reward or satisfaction. and so, we are all marginalized, and i still don't know how to break away from that.
