"The fact is that only those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for) are willing to give up everything – including their lives – in a symbolic gesture of defiance. The rest of us, those with families – kids, grand-kids, vulnerable parents – and homes, jobs, and lives, are not interested in ditching the house, refrigerator, and HD-TV in exchange for a prison cell or a mountain cave."
...made me think of this. And I apologize in advance for not being able to promise that I got it verbatim, I know longer have the book and can't find it anywhere:
"Do you know what you would die for? Do you know what you would kill for? It's amazing to me, but people who don't know what they would kill for and don't know what they would die for think they know what they live for. And yet, unless you are a sociopath, they have to be all the same thing. A life equals a life equals a life.
I've done a lot of things that most people would consider bad. I've set bombs that have killed a lot of people. And no, I won't say I'm entirely at ease with what I've done. But what I CAN tell you is this: At my funeral, no one will say, "He gave his life to increase his company's market share."
I don't think we need to abandon the US/start a revolution, but we do need to start fighting. Obama's openly a Socialist, possibly a Communist, but he doesn't use those words openly, because it would be political suicide to do so... That means there's still some hope, but we need to retake our nation. The FF spent YEARS, openly dissenting in a very hostile environment, entered politics, etc all to try and instill the ideal of freedom -- and it worked.
We abandoned that ideal quite some time ago, and it's time to take it back. We need to join our political parties, talk to our reps, etc.
Frankly, almost no one ever talks to their politicians -- so the politician bases his decisions on approval of the handful of people who do show up.
If any man tells you he's going to go out fighting DC, but isn't willing to be active in politics, because it's "pointless" he's either
A) A liar
B) A madman
C) A plant
Of course it's pointless, at least it seems so at first. How do you think Patrick Henry felt speaking in the House of Burgess for years, w. no effect?
If you back a rat into a corner, he will fight -- even if the odds are clearly against him, even if certain death is the outcome when surrender might provide him continued life.
It really doesn't matter that the act is suicidal. At some point, the outrages of the statists will be so great that "the wrong guy" will be backed into a corner and things will reach a tipping point.
It seems to me that, if people who can see this coming don't want it to end in disaster for the Republic, it behooves THEM to 1) develop the episemology to support it and 2) warn the statists to back the hell off.
It really doesn't matter that the act is suicidal. At some point, the outrages of the statists will be so great that "the wrong guy" will be backed into a corner and things will reach a tipping point.
Yes, the "tipping point" for that "wrong guy."
It seems to me that, if people who can see this coming don't want it to end in disaster for the Republic, it behooves THEM to 1) develop the episemology to support it and 2) warn the statists to back the hell off.
And yet that's Vanderboegh's point - Knox just told them that backing off wasn't necessary.
The number of "successful" revolutions - ones that accomplished their stated intents and actually brought liberty and freedom to the oppressed can be counted on one hand with fingers left over.
I am minorly reassured by the fact that one of those was already "us".
Short of that, though, I agree with your overall conclusion. It's something I've wondered about a lot for a long time. How do you force people to live free when they don't want to? If you let people who want more statism vote, then you're going to get more statism, no matter how good your government starts out.
It seems to me that conservatives have been so busy talking about the principles justifying revolution that they completely neglect the craft of revolution.
The Left, to give them credit, has spent a very long time studying the dynamics of mass action and group influence in general, and especially in revolutions. They know what issues need to be dealt with to bring a revolution about. Their understanding has progressed far beyond Che Guevara.
On the other hand, if Vanderboegh launches his revolution, I expect it to have zero chance of success—not just because we do not have a "revolutionary situation" at present, but because he wouldn't know how to pull it off if we did.
How many of these chest-thumping idiots have read Mao? Alinsky? Gramsci? Jeff Goodwin? Sidney Tarrow? Do they have any idea how hard it is to win a revolution, and what work needs to be done to make it successful?
The Sons of Liberty worked to build their organization for decades. The Bolsheviks too. The French revolutionaries spent less time, and rapidly lost control of the uprising to the most ruthless among them. Does Vanderleun even have a clue how much danger an uprising would bring?
Let me restate something I said earlier: to launch a revolution with an insufficient chance of success is not only stupid, it is immoral.
Even Mannie Garcia O'Kelley Davis wanted a 1 in 10 chance before he would commit.
Even Mannie Garcia O'Kelley Davis wanted a 1 in 10 chance before he would commit.
I'm glad you brought this up, I was just thinking about The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. I think a lot of people who read that miss the big point, which has nothing to do with revolution. The book ultimately emphasizes one key idea - you need to be free, regardless of your government. It's a personal choice.
Excellent piece Kevin; while you might reach Knox, Vanderboegh is a certifiable nutcase.
That said, you quoted Knox ...the whole thing falls apart in practice because people never do what you want them to do or what they ought to do – even when doing so is clearly in their own best interests.
Damn, that sounds a lot like Thomas Frank bemoaning the state of liberalism in Kansas. Over at Markadelphia's blog, I ran across people who think "we [the left/liberals] have a lot of work to do" with respect to recalcitrant Americans who do not embrace The One. I inquired if that would include re-education camps - to which NO ONE replied "of course not". Cousins to Vanderboegh, they haven't got the guts to actually do anything like that.
Way back in October of 1995, my wife and I attended a trade show in Paris. What is relevant about that trip is an event that happened on the way back.
We flew back on a TWA L-1011 from Paris to JFK in New York. We sat in seats 1 and 2 in row 53, in that small section of about ten rows all the way in the back. That little section of about 90 or so seats was filled with Russian immigrants. My nose told me emphatically that their trip, so far, had been a long one, and we had a long way yet to go.
Right across the aisle sat what appeared to be a middle aged couple traveling with a granddaughter about five years old. The were a stereotype right out of Life magazine. He appeared to have worked hard, his faced burned by the sun and frozen by the wind, and her cheeks a bright red as they peeked around the kerchief that was knotted beneath her chin. He was wearing a well worn tweed suit coat that might have fit about 25 pounds ago, and she was wearing a cotton dress over her dumpy frame that was more patches than original fabric. She carried the child while he carried a small bundle of boxes that were neatly stacked and carefully tied together with a ribbon.
What made it memorable was what happened as they took their seats in all the hubbub and confusion of immigrants who don't speak the language of air travel. She picked up the child and sidled into their seats, after which he slid into his seat next to them and on the other side of the aisle from me. They sat down, stowed their bundle, and got the child belted in.
Then, when all was ready for flight, he squared his shoulders and took a deep breath. Then he let it out and slowly, ever so slowly, slumped forward until his forehead was against the top of the seat back in front of him. Then I noticed his eyes were closed and his hands were shaking. He sat there, slumped over, his hands still shaking, for a full two minutes. Then he slowly straightened, leaned back, and I noticed tears in his eyes and hers.
What had they been through to get where they were?
I'd have given a month's pay to know his thoughts at that point, but I didn't intrude. As the flight progressed, it became apparent that they didn't speak English, only Russian.
That was thirteen years ago. I can't help but wonder what these people think of Obama. I have thought of them often as more and more of the reality of Obama has come to light.
Do you suppose they'll defend the freedom they came so far to find?
"Excellent piece Kevin; while you might reach Knox, Vanderboegh is a certifiable nutcase."
If true, that just complicates your problem, doesn't it?
There is a line in Michael Collins, when Collins is complaining to Harry Boland about DeValera splitting them up by taking Boland to America. Why, asks Boland, do you think Dev wants to break us up? Because, says Collins, we might actually achieve the Irish Republic he just wants to talk about.
The Leviathan comes. Either you sort it out, or it sorts you out. Choose.
"Obama's openly a Socialist, possibly a Communist, but he doesn't use those words openly, because it would be political suicide to do so..."
Not so much.
If you dig, hell, just scratch the surface over at the Democratic Underground, you'll find it filled with those who are of the same vein, and are proud of it.
If true, that just complicates your problem, doesn't it?
From the standpoint of preserving my rights from people frightened of fringe dwellers? Yes, it does. Let me give you a fairly benign example - locally we will vote on a beach alcohol ban tomorrow. There is a good chance that I won't ever get to have a beer or glass of wine while watching the sunset on the sand because people are so fed up with the problem cases out there. Now, it's stupid to ban everyone from drinking because a few people cause problems - but that's democracy for you. Leviathan isn't the tyranny of a few evil men, it is the banality of the common ones. That is a fight you can never win through violent means, and you truly have to be nuts to believe you can. Consider Franklin's words "a Republic, if you can keep it".
There is a line in Michael Collins...
Rather than just watch the movie (which got many facts wrong), you might study his actual history.
And you should note that deValera plunged Ireland into an utterly pointless civil war. It's funny you should have mentioned all this, since your rhetoric reminds me just a bit of some of the IRA supporters I've known.
I have a challenge for you, one that actually corresponds to your own interests. In order to demonstrate that any such uprising could actually succeed, what you need is a show of strength.
To wit:
Have a demonstration of not less than 100,000 people on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the majority of whom are carrying empty holsters and signs threatening violent revolution. At this demonstration, have the featured speakers make an unambiguous threat to the government that they are risking violent overthrow. The demonstration must be advertised in advance as featuring calls for violent revolution.
100,000 people is not that many. There are some 90 million gun owners. If you cannot mobilize less than one percent of them to make the mild sacrifice of going to Washington and being part of a rally, then you have no chance to overthrow the government and it would be immoral to try.
The folks who believe in the USC as written (including Knox, Vanderboegh, our host, and all of the commenters here, I submit) do not seek "revolution".
They seek (again, I submit) "restoration", which is a wildly different concept - to wit:
1) We had a viable form of representative republican self-government, focused almost overwhelmingly at the local and state level;
2) Statists, beginning with Abe Lincoln and continuing through Frank Roosevelt right up to GWB and either of the yutzes now in contention, used military force, taxpayer-funded bribes, and political coercion to create and maintain an American Empire;
3) That Empire exhausted itself through greed, overreach, financial profligacy, and the moral corruption of its citizens, leading to its fall;
and
4) Out of the resulting chaos, in certain portions of the former Empire, the old ways of limited government, personal responsibility, and armed society etiquette will be restored.
See Spungin's Neither Predator nor Prey for vignettes from the coming stage 3 to stage 4 transition.
The "politicals" in the crowd can continue to self-manipulate and call it a meaningful relationship based on mutual respect and support.
I'd rather work on a viable path to the desired endstate.
"The fact is that only those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for) are willing to give up everything – including their lives – in a symbolic gesture of defiance."
But this:
"The rest of us, those with families – kids, grand-kids, vulnerable parents – and homes, jobs, and lives, are not interested in ditching the house, refrigerator, and HD-TV in exchange for a prison cell or a mountain cave."
- does not necessarily follow from the above, the reason being that "those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for)" is a purely subjective perception. If "The rest of us, those with families – kids, grand-kids, vulnerable parents – and homes, jobs, and lives" PERCEIVE the choice as not between losing it all or saving something, but only a choice between losing it fast or losing it slow.... well, there's your bloody revolution in the making, whether any of us like it or not.
"Let them eat cake" is a phrase that didn't actually *change the conditions* of those ruled to even the tiniest degree, and in all likelihood was never even SAID by the person guillotined over it. And yet such propaganda was and is used for what? To make the peasantry *perceive themselves as* "those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for)".
Note:
All avatars and any images or other media embedded in comments were hosted on the JS-Kit website and have been lost;
references to haloscan comments have been partially automatically remapped, but accuracy is not guaranteed and corrections are solicited.
If you notice any problems with this page or wish to have your home page link updated, please contact John Hardin <jhardin@impsec.org>
JS-Kit/Echo comments for article at http://smallestminority.blogspot.com/2008/11/philosophy-revolution-and-restoration.html (22 comments)
Tentative mapping of comments to original article, corrections solicited.
Hello, Kevin--
I recommend a look at David Codrea's response to both Mike Vanderboegh and Jeff Knox at The War on Guns, iffen you ain't already done.
I'm going to post something in my spot, to capitalize on the Smallest Minoralanche that is undoubtedly coming my way. ;-)
III
Yeah, I've already done that, but thanks.
This...
"The fact is that only those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for) are willing to give up everything – including their lives – in a symbolic gesture of defiance. The rest of us, those with families – kids, grand-kids, vulnerable parents – and homes, jobs, and lives, are not interested in ditching the house, refrigerator, and HD-TV in exchange for a prison cell or a mountain cave."
...made me think of this. And I apologize in advance for not being able to promise that I got it verbatim, I know longer have the book and can't find it anywhere:
"Do you know what you would die for? Do you know what you would kill for? It's amazing to me, but people who don't know what they would kill for and don't know what they would die for think they know what they live for. And yet, unless you are a sociopath, they have to be all the same thing. A life equals a life equals a life.
I've done a lot of things that most people would consider bad. I've set bombs that have killed a lot of people. And no, I won't say I'm entirely at ease with what I've done. But what I CAN tell you is this: At my funeral, no one will say, "He gave his life to increase his company's market share."
- Daniel Keys Moran, "The Last Dancer"
I don't think we need to abandon the US/start a revolution, but we do need to start fighting. Obama's openly a Socialist, possibly a Communist, but he doesn't use those words openly, because it would be political suicide to do so... That means there's still some hope, but we need to retake our nation. The FF spent YEARS, openly dissenting in a very hostile environment, entered politics, etc all to try and instill the ideal of freedom -- and it worked.
We abandoned that ideal quite some time ago, and it's time to take it back. We need to join our political parties, talk to our reps, etc.
Frankly, almost no one ever talks to their politicians -- so the politician bases his decisions on approval of the handful of people who do show up.
If any man tells you he's going to go out fighting DC, but isn't willing to be active in politics, because it's "pointless" he's either
A) A liar
B) A madman
C) A plant
Of course it's pointless, at least it seems so at first. How do you think Patrick Henry felt speaking in the House of Burgess for years, w. no effect?
If you back a rat into a corner, he will fight -- even if the odds are clearly against him, even if certain death is the outcome when surrender might provide him continued life.
It really doesn't matter that the act is suicidal. At some point, the outrages of the statists will be so great that "the wrong guy" will be backed into a corner and things will reach a tipping point.
It seems to me that, if people who can see this coming don't want it to end in disaster for the Republic, it behooves THEM to 1) develop the episemology to support it and 2) warn the statists to back the hell off.
M
It really doesn't matter that the act is suicidal. At some point, the outrages of the statists will be so great that "the wrong guy" will be backed into a corner and things will reach a tipping point.
Yes, the "tipping point" for that "wrong guy."
It seems to me that, if people who can see this coming don't want it to end in disaster for the Republic, it behooves THEM to 1) develop the episemology to support it and 2) warn the statists to back the hell off.
And yet that's Vanderboegh's point - Knox just told them that backing off wasn't necessary.
And, unfortunately, I'm not sure Knox is wrong.
The number of "successful" revolutions - ones that accomplished their stated intents and actually brought liberty and freedom to the oppressed can be counted on one hand with fingers left over.
I am minorly reassured by the fact that one of those was already "us".
Short of that, though, I agree with your overall conclusion. It's something I've wondered about a lot for a long time. How do you force people to live free when they don't want to? If you let people who want more statism vote, then you're going to get more statism, no matter how good your government starts out.
It seems to me that conservatives have been so busy talking about the principles justifying revolution that they completely neglect the craft of revolution.
The Left, to give them credit, has spent a very long time studying the dynamics of mass action and group influence in general, and especially in revolutions. They know what issues need to be dealt with to bring a revolution about. Their understanding has progressed far beyond Che Guevara.
On the other hand, if Vanderboegh launches his revolution, I expect it to have zero chance of success—not just because we do not have a "revolutionary situation" at present, but because he wouldn't know how to pull it off if we did.
How many of these chest-thumping idiots have read Mao? Alinsky? Gramsci? Jeff Goodwin? Sidney Tarrow? Do they have any idea how hard it is to win a revolution, and what work needs to be done to make it successful?
The Sons of Liberty worked to build their organization for decades. The Bolsheviks too. The French revolutionaries spent less time, and rapidly lost control of the uprising to the most ruthless among them. Does Vanderleun even have a clue how much danger an uprising would bring?
Let me restate something I said earlier: to launch a revolution with an insufficient chance of success is not only stupid, it is immoral.
Even Mannie Garcia O'Kelley Davis wanted a 1 in 10 chance before he would commit.
Jeff Knox responds:
http://waronguns.blogspot.com/2008/11/jeff-knox-responds.html
Even Mannie Garcia O'Kelley Davis wanted a 1 in 10 chance before he would commit.
I'm glad you brought this up, I was just thinking about The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. I think a lot of people who read that miss the big point, which has nothing to do with revolution. The book ultimately emphasizes one key idea - you need to be free, regardless of your government. It's a personal choice.
Excellent piece Kevin; while you might reach Knox, Vanderboegh is a certifiable nutcase.
That said, you quoted Knox ...the whole thing falls apart in practice because people never do what you want them to do or what they ought to do – even when doing so is clearly in their own best interests.
Damn, that sounds a lot like Thomas Frank bemoaning the state of liberalism in Kansas. Over at Markadelphia's blog, I ran across people who think "we [the left/liberals] have a lot of work to do" with respect to recalcitrant Americans who do not embrace The One. I inquired if that would include re-education camps - to which NO ONE replied "of course not". Cousins to Vanderboegh, they haven't got the guts to actually do anything like that.
Sadly, I really am that stuffy when "under the influence".
Thanks for the link anyway, Kevin.
Way back in October of 1995, my wife and I attended a trade show in Paris. What is relevant about that trip is an event that happened on the way back.
We flew back on a TWA L-1011 from Paris to JFK in New York. We sat in seats 1 and 2 in row 53, in that small section of about ten rows all the way in the back. That little section of about 90 or so seats was filled with Russian immigrants. My nose told me emphatically that their trip, so far, had been a long one, and we had a long way yet to go.
Right across the aisle sat what appeared to be a middle aged couple traveling with a granddaughter about five years old. The were a stereotype right out of Life magazine. He appeared to have worked hard, his faced burned by the sun and frozen by the wind, and her cheeks a bright red as they peeked around the kerchief that was knotted beneath her chin. He was wearing a well worn tweed suit coat that might have fit about 25 pounds ago, and she was wearing a cotton dress over her dumpy frame that was more patches than original fabric. She carried the child while he carried a small bundle of boxes that were neatly stacked and carefully tied together with a ribbon.
What made it memorable was what happened as they took their seats in all the hubbub and confusion of immigrants who don't speak the language of air travel. She picked up the child and sidled into their seats, after which he slid into his seat next to them and on the other side of the aisle from me. They sat down, stowed their bundle, and got the child belted in.
Then, when all was ready for flight, he squared his shoulders and took a deep breath. Then he let it out and slowly, ever so slowly, slumped forward until his forehead was against the top of the seat back in front of him. Then I noticed his eyes were closed and his hands were shaking. He sat there, slumped over, his hands still shaking, for a full two minutes. Then he slowly straightened, leaned back, and I noticed tears in his eyes and hers.
What had they been through to get where they were?
I'd have given a month's pay to know his thoughts at that point, but I didn't intrude. As the flight progressed, it became apparent that they didn't speak English, only Russian.
That was thirteen years ago. I can't help but wonder what these people think of Obama. I have thought of them often as more and more of the reality of Obama has come to light.
Do you suppose they'll defend the freedom they came so far to find?
DJ, may I post that comment in its entirety?
Be my guest.
I'm pessimistic.
By and large Americans have lost the spirit of Liberty -- and without that spirit it will be impossible to regain the real thing.
"Excellent piece Kevin; while you might reach Knox, Vanderboegh is a certifiable nutcase."
If true, that just complicates your problem, doesn't it?
There is a line in Michael Collins, when Collins is complaining to Harry Boland about DeValera splitting them up by taking Boland to America. Why, asks Boland, do you think Dev wants to break us up? Because, says Collins, we might actually achieve the Irish Republic he just wants to talk about.
The Leviathan comes. Either you sort it out, or it sorts you out. Choose.
Vanderboegh
III
"Obama's openly a Socialist, possibly a Communist, but he doesn't use those words openly, because it would be political suicide to do so..."
Not so much.
If you dig, hell, just scratch the surface over at the Democratic Underground, you'll find it filled with those who are of the same vein, and are proud of it.
Be very afraid.
If true, that just complicates your problem, doesn't it?
From the standpoint of preserving my rights from people frightened of fringe dwellers? Yes, it does. Let me give you a fairly benign example - locally we will vote on a beach alcohol ban tomorrow. There is a good chance that I won't ever get to have a beer or glass of wine while watching the sunset on the sand because people are so fed up with the problem cases out there. Now, it's stupid to ban everyone from drinking because a few people cause problems - but that's democracy for you. Leviathan isn't the tyranny of a few evil men, it is the banality of the common ones. That is a fight you can never win through violent means, and you truly have to be nuts to believe you can. Consider Franklin's words "a Republic, if you can keep it".
There is a line in Michael Collins...
Rather than just watch the movie (which got many facts wrong), you might study his actual history.
And you should note that deValera plunged Ireland into an utterly pointless civil war. It's funny you should have mentioned all this, since your rhetoric reminds me just a bit of some of the IRA supporters I've known.
Mr. Vanderboegh,
I have a challenge for you, one that actually corresponds to your own interests. In order to demonstrate that any such uprising could actually succeed, what you need is a show of strength.
To wit:
Have a demonstration of not less than 100,000 people on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., the majority of whom are carrying empty holsters and signs threatening violent revolution. At this demonstration, have the featured speakers make an unambiguous threat to the government that they are risking violent overthrow. The demonstration must be advertised in advance as featuring calls for violent revolution.
100,000 people is not that many. There are some 90 million gun owners. If you cannot mobilize less than one percent of them to make the mild sacrifice of going to Washington and being part of a rally, then you have no chance to overthrow the government and it would be immoral to try.
Let that be your touchstone.
The wrong word is being used here, folks.
The folks who believe in the USC as written (including Knox, Vanderboegh, our host, and all of the commenters here, I submit) do not seek "revolution".
They seek (again, I submit) "restoration", which is a wildly different concept - to wit:
1) We had a viable form of representative republican self-government, focused almost overwhelmingly at the local and state level;
2) Statists, beginning with Abe Lincoln and continuing through Frank Roosevelt right up to GWB and either of the yutzes now in contention, used military force, taxpayer-funded bribes, and political coercion to create and maintain an American Empire;
3) That Empire exhausted itself through greed, overreach, financial profligacy, and the moral corruption of its citizens, leading to its fall;
and
4) Out of the resulting chaos, in certain portions of the former Empire, the old ways of limited government, personal responsibility, and armed society etiquette will be restored.
See Spungin's Neither Predator nor Prey for vignettes from the coming stage 3 to stage 4 transition.
The "politicals" in the crowd can continue to self-manipulate and call it a meaningful relationship based on mutual respect and support.
I'd rather work on a viable path to the desired endstate.
See ya on the dynamic range.
I gotta admit, I must agree with this 100%:
"The fact is that only those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for) are willing to give up everything – including their lives – in a symbolic gesture of defiance."
But this:
"The rest of us, those with families – kids, grand-kids, vulnerable parents – and homes, jobs, and lives, are not interested in ditching the house, refrigerator, and HD-TV in exchange for a prison cell or a mountain cave."
- does not necessarily follow from the above, the reason being that "those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for)" is a purely subjective perception. If "The rest of us, those with families – kids, grand-kids, vulnerable parents – and homes, jobs, and lives" PERCEIVE the choice as not between losing it all or saving something, but only a choice between losing it fast or losing it slow.... well, there's your bloody revolution in the making, whether any of us like it or not.
"Let them eat cake" is a phrase that didn't actually *change the conditions* of those ruled to even the tiniest degree, and in all likelihood was never even SAID by the person guillotined over it. And yet such propaganda was and is used for what? To make the peasantry *perceive themselves as* "those who have nothing to lose (and nothing to live for)".
Note: All avatars and any images or other media embedded in comments were hosted on the JS-Kit website and have been lost; references to haloscan comments have been partially automatically remapped, but accuracy is not guaranteed and corrections are solicited.
If you notice any problems with this page or wish to have your home page link updated, please contact John Hardin <jhardin@impsec.org>