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Found some food for thought recently. I didn’t know that there is even a word for self-sustainability, independence and ‘live and let live’ philosophy:

Libertarianism is a political philosophy advocating that individuals should be free to do whatever they wish with their person or property, as long as they do not infringe on the same liberty of others.

There are two types of libertarians. One type holds as a fundamental maxim that all human interaction should be voluntary and consensual. They maintain that the initiation of force against another person or his property, with “force” meaning the use of physical force, the threat of it, or the commission of fraud against someone who has not initiated physical force, threat, or fraud, is a violation of that principle (many of these are individualist anarchists or anarcho-capitalists).

The other type comes from a consequentialist or utilitarian standpoint. Instead of having moral prohibitions against initiation of force, these support a limited government that engages in the minimum amount of initiatory force (such as levying taxes to provide some public goods such as defense and roads, as well as some minimal regulation), because they believe it to be necessary to ensure maximum individual freedom (these are minarchists).

Libertarians do not oppose force used in response to initiatory aggressions such as violence, fraud or trespassing. Libertarians favor an ethic of self-responsibility and strongly oppose the welfare state, because they believe forcing someone to provide aid to others is ethically wrong, ultimately counter-productive, or both.

Libertarians also strongly oppose conscription because they believe no one should be forced to fight a war they don’t support (and, ideally, many would like it to be left to individual decision as to which war, if any, to fund).

You can read more about this, at Wikipedia.

There are plenty of Libertarians in history and present, with the recently deceased Milton Friedman as one famous example, who was best known for reviving interest in the money supply as a determinant of the nominal value of output, that is, the quantity theory of money.

Recently I saw the movie The Libertine with Johnny Depp, which is about the life of the ‘infamous’ Earl of Rochester, John Wilmot. He was a free-thinking and open-minded 17th century poet who famously drank and debauched his way to an early grave, only to earn posthumous critical acclaim for his life’s work. Although the film is at first quite disturbing and hard to follow, it’s really an amazing piece of work, with a brilliant Johnny Depp, who believably embodies this free-thinking and almost careless individual in these dark times.

Sometimes I really wonder, where Socialism, Communism, Social Capitalism, Religions, Wars and the Competitive Pressure of Open Markets were/are driving us as individuals in the end. Are we really only masses of sheep in the flow of times and people, determined to follow the higher callings of status, wealth and celebrity stardome? There must be something else, right?

No?

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written by Chris