======== Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian,talk.politics.libertarian,alt.individualism,alt.anarchism,alt.society.anarchy,alt.philosophy.objectivism Subject: We don't need your guns at all... From: gswann@primenet.com (Greg Swann) Date: 18 May 1998 22:49:01 -0700 We don't need your guns at all... You say that I am hurting your government by trading the best I have for the best I can get, for paying my own way, not hurting anyone. If I hurt you by helping my customers, then what? My customers don't hurt me, they don't give me orders, they don't need men with guns to protect them and to force their orders. We don't need guns to get along. We don't need your guns at all. There are too many ironies to iron out in this absurd anti-trust suit against MediocreSoft. The most amusing, of course, is that MS is _not_ to be prosecuted for selling bug-ridden trash that's long on features but short on value. Next, perhaps, is the fact that MS is by far the Fortune 500 company most heavily infiltrated by libertarians. Amazingly, none of them has had any influence on the inept legal strategy pursued so far. The irony that scrapes like the rusty chains of slavery, though, is the one highlighted above. The federal and state persecutors who have brought this awful lawsuit bent over backwards to use the word "force" with respect to MS. This is a scurrilous lie. MediocreSoft products are crap and the people who use them are unsophisticated at best, _but everyone involved IS A VOLUNTEER._ There is NO force in use by MS, and, if there were, it would be a matter for the criminal courts of the State of Washington. The _only_ force in play in this matter is the force--physical force deployed by armed functionaries--that is to be brought to bear by the federal and state governments. We are each of us monopolists of labor. I sell my time and only my time and only on my terms. If you don't like my terms, you seek elsewhere. If you insist that you must have my time, you must meet my terms. Trade is only trade when it is _mutually_ voluntary. When you attempt to take my labor by force or the threat of force, that's slavery. When you attempt to impose terms unilaterally--which is what the federal and state attorneys general are attempting to do--you are committing a crime. A "trade" that is not _mutually_ voluntary is slavery--or rape. MediocreSoft plays bullyboy negotiating games because its products stink. It has a temporary market dominance based on the irrational fears of ignoramuses. This will not last. Like IBM before it, it appears to be an ominous threat, but in fact it's just a dinosaur. Sic semper tyrannosaurus. The _real_ threat is the state, the wielders of _actual_ force, the flailers of _genuine_ guns. I doubt that the principals of Netscape and Novell and Sun Microsystems are wise enough to recognize the awful dogs they've loosed; if they had any brains they'd compete in the marketplace rather than try to steal market share by force of arms. But it seems clear that the personal computer industry--the only free industry left in America--will have good cause to lament this awful suit. Some people want to portray MediocreSoft and its chairman, Bill Gates, as persecuted geniuses. This seems wide of the mark. MediocreSoft preys on the irrational fears of the irrationally fearful--just as IBM did--and this is the extent of any genius it has displayed. But if _any_ one of its mutually voluntary transactions is lawful and just, then _every_ one of them is, and there is no justice whatever is calling MediocreSoft criminal for being good at selling bad software to people who don't know any better and don't want any better. Everyone involved is a volunteer. The point is this: it goes for you, too--you craven, greedy, evil, spiteful labor monopolist. The armed functionaries of the amassed attorneys general won't be bringing an anti-trust suit against you, but there's no reason why they couldn't--using exactly the same "logic" they're using against MediocreSoft. We were promised less government, not more, and we certainly don't need _actual_ monopolists wielding _actual_ force to "protect" us from the greatest has-beens of the next century: MediocreSoft and Bill Gates. Can the people who screwed up the mails and transportation and communication and heavy industry and education and national security and criminal justice somehow do something _other_ than screw up the computer revolution? If Bill Gates were really a genius, he'd vow not to release any new software while this suit is pending. That way, millions of end-users desperate for the latest batch of new bugs--Windows 98--would scream for the dead hand of the state--the death-dealing hand of the state--to get the hell out of the way. We don't need protection from MediocreSoft. We need protection from "sanctioned" criminals with guns. We don't need guns to get along. We don't need your guns at all... What's shown below is me writing twelve years ago. The issues are exactly the same, and so are the consequences. I was amazed and delighted by the ruling in the net censorship case, and all I have left to hope for is another judge as wise and as penetrating. It's a shame that the "geniuses" at MediocreSoft and Netscape and Novell and Sun are not themselves wise, but--all to the spite of pouting losers and gloating winners and "sanctioned" gun-thugs--the world runs by itself. The sky doesn't fall, bad ideas do. I wish you peace, Greg Swann 5/18/98 From "Mantrap" (http://www.primenet.com/~gswann/Mantrap.html): A mantrap... Is that what it is? As Curtis sat in the courtroom, he reflected on all he'd seen, all he'd thought about since coming to Dalton. Is that what it is? A giant trap for men...? But it's the same all over the country, not just here. It's the same all over the world, where it isn't worse... Curtis was watching a man pleading for his life. A man who cared enough for his values to fight for them, to fight the mightiest and most fearsome gang of all, the gang of the state, with its armies and warheads. Was he fighting for the right to commit murder, theft, rape? No. He was fighting for the right to commit commerce. Curtis had fought a losing battle with disgust as he watched case after case of men convicted of loving their lives, their families and their values. Commerce was by far the most common crime in Dalton... There was a man convicted of installing a new freezer in his store without having the state inspector certify that he was not deliberately ruining his inventory. There was an elderly gentleman declared a criminal for closing off part of his house without getting the state's construction permit. There was a child of perhaps fifteen, a true juvenile delinquent, who had committed the heinous deed of selling magazine subscriptions door to door without a work permit. There was an Asian man who might have been twenty-five or fifty. His crime was pushing a quarter-ton cart through the streets of Dalton, sparing people the trouble of driving into town if they needed fresh fruits and vegetables. There was a farmer with tired and defiant eyes. He'd sprayed his plants with a forbidden herbicide. The judge took account that the taboo substance had only recently been outlawed. But he said that just because the farmer had an unsellable stock of the stuff, that didn't give him the right to use it. There was a blowsy young woman who was shown to have offended the gods by giving men pleasure for their money. The fact that her arrest proved that people wanted her product was not considered. There was a man convicted of operating an unlicensed limousine. Out of pure spite and malice, he'd been victimizing his elderly neighbors by driving them to and from the supermarkets and laundromats. Curtis fought to restrain himself when he saw a boy of ten declared truant and ordered to a state home. The child had been working as a dishwasher to help feed his family. Compulsory dependency... Did any of these people _need_ this? In persecuting them, was the state doing anything besides hindering that which they did not need help to do? They were independent, totally free. And for _this_ crime, they were persecuted... A mantrap. A system that enshrines those who seek to destroy values, such as this judge, these lawyers, these armed men, and their chattels on the state's plantations--the welfare system, the criminal justice system, the civil service. A system devised to destroy those who seek values. A god who would welcome and embrace you only if you declared yourself impotent, renounced both your mind and your body and gave him unlimited power over both. If you deny your ability to feed yourself, he feeds you. If you deny your ability to think for yourself, he tells you what to do. If you hate yourself, he will love you. But if you love yourself, he will hate you. He will destroy you... A mantrap... A machine that rewards you to the extent that you do not deserve to live, and punishes you to the extent that you do. He thought of Ayn Rand, the philosopher who spoke of "zero holding a mortgage over life." _This_ is what she was talking about; _this_ is the "anti-man, anti-mind, anti-life." To reward a man to the extent that he kills himself, and to kill him when he _does not_ kill himself--death is the only possible goal. Does it matter that they don't go the whole way? Is a mass murderer more of a murderer than a spouse killer? Isn't the thing that lets them say that you can't earn a living without a useless piece of paper, isn't that the same thing that was used to forbid life to the Jews of Hitler's Germany, to the Kulaks, to the Ukrainian peasants, to the Kampucheans and the Mikitos? Is a difference of degree a difference of kind? If two men are headed for Chicago and one is closer, is the other headed someplace else...? No. The same goals are served by the same defense. The issue is values, with the first being the value of life. Mine is the way of serving it--to think, to work, to live. The things that stand opposed to that are anti-life, whether they admit to it or not... A man pleading for his life, except that men who are compelled to this place are unqualified to plead. The god of death does not hear their prayers. He was a stubby man, short and stocky. His thick black hair was streaked with gray. Curtis admired the bright beacon in his proud dark eyes. "Is this what I pay taxes for?," he demanded of the judge. "What have I done wrong? Who is injured by what I have done?" The man was a Mediterranean, a Greek or a Turk; he spoke with a thick accent. "You were operating your business after hours," the judge said. "Your license specifically prohibits you from operating after sundown. I believe the restriction results from the noblest of purposes. The City Council wished to protect your competitors from you." "First," said the man. "My competitors can get protection from me any time they want it. All they gotta do is do what I do better than I do it. I know it works, because that's how I protect myself from them!" The audience in the courtroom laughed. "Second, the competition you are protecting from me has failed. He's out of business. You protected him to death!" "The witness is ordered to restrain himself." "Yeah," said the man, shaking his head in disgust. "You like giving orders, don't you? Do you know anything about earning a living? Do you think it's safe to order a man to commit suicide, or else you'll kill him?" "I don't know _what_ you are talking about!" "No? Am I mistaken? When I was a boy, there was man in our village--maybe you have this type of man in America? In exchange for money and obedience, he would protect you from his gang. So long as you paid money, made way, he wouldn't break your legs or wreck your shop or rape your woman. The night before I came here, I got him alone and told him what I thought of him. He didn't know what I was talking about, either..." "Do I understand that the witness is threatening me?," the judge demanded. "No," said the man. "Just telling a story. Do you know about my business? Do you know what I do to feed my wife and children? Is there any part of what I have that I owe to you, that I have stolen from you?" "It is not claimed that you have stolen anything." "No? Then why am I here? This is court, place for thieves. I have stolen nothing. I have hurt no one. Do you know why I was arrested?" "As I say, you're charged with violating the terms of your license." "Yes. You know what this means? I have a food truck, you know what that is? Do judges eat from food trucks? It's a pick-up truck with a refrigerator. I fill it with food and take it out to the factories. Men in factories, they don't have the choices of judges downtown, they eat from home or eat from machines or they don't eat. I bring other food--good sandwiches, good fruit, candy, cake, hot coffee. "Men at the factories, they like me. Women too. I work four plants every day, four lunches, eight breaks. I do a good business, maybe a hundred a day, after everything. Including taxes to pay so judges can eat in restaurants... "In town, I have one competitor. Young kid taking over his father's truck. They used to have two trucks, worked the late shifts at five different places. But between the shutdowns and the taxes and everything, they couldn't make it. They sold one truck. It's in Cleveland now. The kid starts driving the other, he's on the road twelve hours a day. He makes his runs at the shops they have left, starts at six at night, doesn't finish until six in the morning. Do judges ever have to work that hard? But still he can't make it. Two shops shut down their night crews, and my competitor, he goes down with them. That truck is now in Dayton. "So I'm left. There's one crew still working of those he served. So what do I do? I get up at four in the morning to take them some lunch. I don't work their breaks. They can bring their own coffee. And I don't make much on their lunch trade, just enough to get me out of bed. For what you cost me today, I've been getting up for nothing for the last month... "But think! Think! There were three trucks, now there is one. Those two trucks that are gone will not come back without new capital. Do you see people rushing to town to invest their money? There is now just my one truck, and when you have destroyed me, made me sell my truck in Dayton or Columbus, who will feed the men? "Do you see? You tell me I am evil. Why? For selling people what they want, where and when they want it. You tell me I am selfish. Why? Because I get out of a nice warm bed to sell food. You tell me I am exploiting the men by selling them food. You say that I am hurting your government by trading the best I have for the best I can get, for paying my own way, not hurting anyone. If I hurt you by helping my customers, then what? My customers don't hurt me, they don't give me orders, they don't need men with guns to protect them and to force their orders. We don't need guns to get along. We don't need your guns at all. "And yet, here I am... So you must be like that man in my village. How much do you charge to not break my legs--or is it my neck this time?" The judge said, "Are you through?" "Yes." "Fifty dollars or five days." The man paid his fine, swearing softly in a language Curtis couldn't identify. His case was called next. The state briefly presented its evidence. The judge agreed that the state had enough to warrant the charge. He ordered Curtis held over for trial. Bail was foregone; the judge said he feared Curtis might run. He asked if Curtis wished to speak for the record. No bail... Curtis was stunned. This was worse than anything he'd considered, worse than the wildest nightmare. It took him a moment to collect his thoughts. "I'd like to underscore what was said by the man who just spoke," he said. The dark headed man had been walking out, but now he turned to watch. "You claim that you are acting in the service of values, but where you have a chance to serve the values needed to live, you ignore it. I am today charged with having set fire to my own property. If you knew what I did to get my factory operating, you would know I did not destroy it. But since you do not know this, or refuse to take account of it, you charge me with this crime. Fine. I will be proved innocent. But I will have been innocent the whole time that you will have slandered my name and stolen my time. My factory burned this morning. In order to get it producing again, I need to give it my full time and attention. By locking me up, you are damaging my own financial interest and the financial interests of my employees. You are wasting our money on a fruitless trial, and at the same time forbidding us to make more money. What value is it that you hope to serve by this?" "Young man," said the judge. "I have a hard-won reputation of standing for the common good." "...by standing _against_ those who are _un_common?" "I don't know what you're talking about!" "Yes, you do. Tell me, your majesty, whom do you propose to eat after the producers of Dalton are picked to the bone...?" The dark man burst into applause. The judge said, "Take him out." The chief stayed with Curtis all the way to his cell. When they got there he said, "Listen, Mr. Randolph. After what you said in there, I'm not sure if you belong in here, or if Judge Rollins does. I think that no bail business is just plain spite, and I have a good idea where it came from... Anyway, you can do some of your business from here, can't you? I can't put a phone in here, it would cause talk. But I can give you unlimited visitors, and they can bring whatever you need to work on." "That's decent of you, Chief. But aren't you afraid I'll get hold of a revolver and make my escape?" Chief Nelson smiled. "I can afford a few bullets to save the taxpayers the cost of a trial. But I don't think you'll try to escape." "Hmm," said Curtis. "Does that you mean you think I'm innocent?" "That means, come what does, you're the kind of man I can get along with. I'm not going to go out my way to hurt you." _____________________________________________________________________________ gswann@primenet.com http://www.primenet.com/~gswann (last updated 3/3/98) 70640.1574@compuserve.com Permission is explicitly granted to repost/republish unmodified. We are what we do, not what we say we do. - Janio Valenta _____________________________________________________________________________