Good article about the nonsense being proposed in the US about civilian “volunteering” programmes which are not in fact, voluntary. It is worth keeping an eye on this issue because I recall that David Cameron, Tory leader, might be keen on a sort of non-military version of national service as a way to deal with problems of teen crime and lack of personal responsibility. Bad move. See my post below for how it is working in a free market that is what is required. Treat people as free adults: it works
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Volunteering has to be voluntaryJuly 18th, 2008 |
 8 comments to Volunteering has to be voluntary |
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Quick search shows that working at 13-14 is neither prohibited, nor rare:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_working_age
http://www.worksmart.org.uk/rights/viewquestion.php?eny=650
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article2781330.ece
“About half of all children aged between 13 and 16 have part-time jobs, a workforce of about 1.5 million, according to the NSPCC.”
One aspect of this (among the many) is that one of its primary purposes is to shove young people into the Third Sector- the progressive network- providing them with not only a reliable, constant source of labour with which to carry out their dastardly schemes, but also to ensure that more indoctrination can be done.
One crucial thing libertarians need to somehow find a way to do is turn our guns on the Proggie Network, which is difficult as currently the generalised belief is that they shit rainbows, but their credibility is going to have to be destroyed or we’re doomed, which as I’ve said before I think we are anyway, but if we’re going to try to cling to the bowl rather than just passively disappear round the U-bend it’s something we have to try. Sadly, we are disorganised and but few in number, and all busy with other things trying to run businesses and do jobs and things, we don’t have a pool of eager young activists to do our bidding. Bah.
The reason the Proggies are successful is they set up these networks and are utterly remorseless. They choose a target (e.g. a particular big business) and attack it remorselessly, over decades if need be, never relaxing the pressure, keeping that business on the run with a torrent of propaganda and they don’t stop until it is either utterly destroyed or browbeaten into total compliance. I’ve come to believe that, unfortunately, we have to do the same. That means a remorseless attack on targetted NGOs and charities such as Greenpeace or Oxfam. That means people committed to digging up dirt, and flinging it around, turning whatever minor infraction into something major and devastating. We need to find our versions of Nestle in Africa, or Big Tobacco. We really need boots on the ground.
If youngsters are to be press-ganged into these appalling schemes, then that may give us a little glimmer of a chance, since some of those youngsters might be on our side, and with their eyes and ears open.
It’s time for us to recognise that trying to win the debate can only get us so far. We have to get our enemy on the run, and keep them running. We must be as sly as toads, just as the enemy are.
I wasn’t even thinking of this new and improved flavor of conscription when I did it, but it is fitting: Servitude we can believe in
The Home Office is proposing a “community service” requirement in the future for people who wish to become British citizens. In classic Home Office use of the word “optional”, they frame it in such a way that they are not framing it as being “compulsory”, but merely that they will prolongue the citizenship process for several years in which they will continue to harrass you and charge you for it if you don’t do it.
Yes, I will invoke Godwins Law here, but things like this aren’t too far from compulsory membership of the Hitler Youth.
They are erroneously referring to compulsory unpaid work as compulsory “volunteer” work. There’s probably a better word out there somewhere for compulsory unpaid work…
There is an interesting juxtposition to consider:
A- The requirement in some U.S. high schools for the completion of a specific number of Community Service hours in order to graduate with a diploma.
B- The judicial punishment meted out to those of sufficient notoriety or minimal offense, etc. for a specific period of time in Comunity Service.
1) It’s amazing how we attribute Double Speak as one of the most dreadful realities of 1984 and yet we are awash in it every stinking day right now.
2) I realize that Mises and Austrian Economics may not be the most well loved sister philosophy on the libertarian end of the spectrum fro Samizdatistas, but the discussion in the article about how these programs collapse due to the administrative burden of what counts and what doesn’t is so easily cut through with a little mechanism call PRICING. It is just simply another example of how human interaction falls apart so quickly without a sound system of exchange with willing participants, both judging and exchanging freely. The great hoodwinking of the day (assisted by Double Speak) is that socialism routinely shows its failures and yet it grows and grows.
Perhaps the chief reason Socialism grows and grows is that it expands to fill the voids from abdicated personal obligations, especially personal responsibility, but many others as well.