Much gratitude to you for this. For the past year I've been feeling that humanity is exactly where it needs to be, experiencing just what is needed. It's not an easy feeling, nor do I claim 'rightness' in feeling it.
Free yourself! Its what all the prophets said. Pray quietly alone. Of course the teachings of anyone enlightened are suppressed or modified. Jesus vs what-Rome-made-of-him is an interesting topic. Spiritual suppression, through every conceivable channel, is what we are faced with.
It could be as simple as people no longer charging their phones, nor getting the latest updates and having to cope with electricity cuts and black outs for things to be hollowed out.. All three are weak links in the control network and life will go on as you suggest.
I also like your comments on salvation politics which are always just around the corner. Thank you for an uplifting and encouraging essay.
My interpretation of “Anthropological Reversibility” is that it is what we Voluntaryists practice on principle: the delegitimization of governments and other coercive organizations such as the U.N., religions, etc.
The Voluntaryist phrases it:
“Voluntaryists are advocates of non-political, non-violent strategies to achieve a free society. We reject electoral politics…Governments must cloak their actions in an aura of moral legitimacy in order to sustain their power, and political methods invariably strengthen that legitimacy. Voluntaryists seek instead to delegitimize the State through education, and we advocate withdrawal of the cooperation and tacit consent on which State power ultimately depends.”
And perhaps no Voluntaryist has put it better than Isaac Morehouse:
“When the world becomes free it will not be by the creation of new laws, or the removal of old, or new political leaders, or any election result. It will not be because of a change in government, but because of a change in attitude toward government. Genuine change will come when the state is ignored, not reformed. It will not come when politicians are better, but when they are irrelevant. When state-made law is no longer deemed necessary or important it will not be respected. When it is not respected it will not be enforced because it will not be enforceable. The world can become free of the barbarous relic called the state. The state is a dangerous fiction whose power rests entirely on people’s belief in its necessity, or inevitability. It is not a given that a state must or will always exist. The state, like so many other superstitions now thought to be outrageous, inhumane, and inefficient, can be left in the ash heap of history.
Many once laughed at the notion that an institution as old as humanity itself, the institution of slavery, would or could ever be removed. The prevailing wisdom for centuries, even among those who had discovered the moral repugnance of slavery, was that it was just a part of human nature. Reformers argued the best thing was to work for a more humane version of slavery.
Slavery was an institution that, however evil it may sometimes be and however utopians might imagine a more perfect world without it, was here to stay. Some embarked on efforts to improve the institution, to teach masters to be “good” to their slaves. Some setup rules and mores designed to limit the nastiest outcomes of the institution. But the institution itself was as unavoidable as scarcity and death.
The fatal flaw in this thinking is that slavery and government, unlike scarcity and death, are human institutions. They are, above all, mental constructs. Their physical manifestations are not physical realities humans simply encounter in nature, but realities we create, and humans only create by first imagining. An idea does not become an action unless the individual actor believes that the idea is worth acting on. To subjugate another human being, or to condone or allow the subjugation of one by another, one must first have the idea of subjugation and must believe that acting on it is preferable to ignoring or condemning it. Scarcity and natural death need no such human consent. The old saying about death and taxes turns out to be only half true.
If the state, like slavery, is the result of the ideas held by people it is not inevitable. Some day humanity could look back on the institution called the state with the same sense of shame and wonder that we now have about slavery. How could so many people – many of them good people – live their lives day in and day out surrounded by an institution so inhumane, so nakedly violent and demeaning? Did they really think it was necessary? Did they not understand how degrading it was? It will be hard to understand how so many humans thought the state was inevitable, tolerable and even good. As sure as slavery became a hated relic, so can the state.” From “How the World Will Change” by Isaac Morehouse
Thanks to the Unbekoming people!
I humbly thank you too.
Much gratitude to you for this. For the past year I've been feeling that humanity is exactly where it needs to be, experiencing just what is needed. It's not an easy feeling, nor do I claim 'rightness' in feeling it.
Appreciation and blessings from Sydney Australia.
Free yourself! Its what all the prophets said. Pray quietly alone. Of course the teachings of anyone enlightened are suppressed or modified. Jesus vs what-Rome-made-of-him is an interesting topic. Spiritual suppression, through every conceivable channel, is what we are faced with.
It could be as simple as people no longer charging their phones, nor getting the latest updates and having to cope with electricity cuts and black outs for things to be hollowed out.. All three are weak links in the control network and life will go on as you suggest.
I also like your comments on salvation politics which are always just around the corner. Thank you for an uplifting and encouraging essay.
Interesting article, thanks Unbekoming.
My interpretation of “Anthropological Reversibility” is that it is what we Voluntaryists practice on principle: the delegitimization of governments and other coercive organizations such as the U.N., religions, etc.
The Voluntaryist phrases it:
“Voluntaryists are advocates of non-political, non-violent strategies to achieve a free society. We reject electoral politics…Governments must cloak their actions in an aura of moral legitimacy in order to sustain their power, and political methods invariably strengthen that legitimacy. Voluntaryists seek instead to delegitimize the State through education, and we advocate withdrawal of the cooperation and tacit consent on which State power ultimately depends.”
“No one rules if no one obeys.”
https://voluntaryist.com/
And perhaps no Voluntaryist has put it better than Isaac Morehouse:
“When the world becomes free it will not be by the creation of new laws, or the removal of old, or new political leaders, or any election result. It will not be because of a change in government, but because of a change in attitude toward government. Genuine change will come when the state is ignored, not reformed. It will not come when politicians are better, but when they are irrelevant. When state-made law is no longer deemed necessary or important it will not be respected. When it is not respected it will not be enforced because it will not be enforceable. The world can become free of the barbarous relic called the state. The state is a dangerous fiction whose power rests entirely on people’s belief in its necessity, or inevitability. It is not a given that a state must or will always exist. The state, like so many other superstitions now thought to be outrageous, inhumane, and inefficient, can be left in the ash heap of history.
Many once laughed at the notion that an institution as old as humanity itself, the institution of slavery, would or could ever be removed. The prevailing wisdom for centuries, even among those who had discovered the moral repugnance of slavery, was that it was just a part of human nature. Reformers argued the best thing was to work for a more humane version of slavery.
Slavery was an institution that, however evil it may sometimes be and however utopians might imagine a more perfect world without it, was here to stay. Some embarked on efforts to improve the institution, to teach masters to be “good” to their slaves. Some setup rules and mores designed to limit the nastiest outcomes of the institution. But the institution itself was as unavoidable as scarcity and death.
The fatal flaw in this thinking is that slavery and government, unlike scarcity and death, are human institutions. They are, above all, mental constructs. Their physical manifestations are not physical realities humans simply encounter in nature, but realities we create, and humans only create by first imagining. An idea does not become an action unless the individual actor believes that the idea is worth acting on. To subjugate another human being, or to condone or allow the subjugation of one by another, one must first have the idea of subjugation and must believe that acting on it is preferable to ignoring or condemning it. Scarcity and natural death need no such human consent. The old saying about death and taxes turns out to be only half true.
If the state, like slavery, is the result of the ideas held by people it is not inevitable. Some day humanity could look back on the institution called the state with the same sense of shame and wonder that we now have about slavery. How could so many people – many of them good people – live their lives day in and day out surrounded by an institution so inhumane, so nakedly violent and demeaning? Did they really think it was necessary? Did they not understand how degrading it was? It will be hard to understand how so many humans thought the state was inevitable, tolerable and even good. As sure as slavery became a hated relic, so can the state.” From “How the World Will Change” by Isaac Morehouse
I suggest you interview Isaac.