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Next Sunday I expect to be headed with a crowd of French libertarians, from the place de la Bastille towards the headquarters of the French finance ministry at Bercy in the eastern districts of Paris. Interest in the event seems to be building up, with emails buzzing around asking for a lift from places like Pau (almost in Spain), or has anyone got a couple of flag poles? The Gadsden and the Culpepper flag should be flying.  Meanwhile, in London, not a sausage. November 24th, 2002 | 4 comments - (Comments are closed)
 There is a tendency among Libertarians to worry obsessively about every infringement by the state, to link up instances of state oppression, and to deduce from this either that there is a vast campaign to destroy freedom, or that we’re powerless to combat the tide of enslavement. This makes us seem obsessive, paranoid and miserable company, except to others of a similar emotional condition. One of the problems is that it is literally possible for a single libertarian activist to discover every single instance of arbitrary power by state officials on a given day. The posting by Brian on some local bureaucratic monster in the U.S. state of Illinois is a case in point. Most Europeans would be unable to pick out the state of Illinois on a map (so much for the vaunted European superiority at geography). Yet thanks to Brian’s posting, any English-speaking European looking for examples of state oppression could discover that – somewhere in Illinois – there is an instance of heavy-handedness happening now. Consider what our knowledge in Europe would be of the Waco massacre if it had taken place before outside television broadcasts. Instead of assuming that everything’s worse because our databases are overflowing with complaints, we should note that we have the tools to expose state oppression almost anywhere on this planet. Think of Rodney King. Did police officers never beat black men before hand-held video cameras existed? November 20th, 2002 | 2 comments - (Comments are closed)
That sounds like the name of some old British movie… but what I am referring to is the Libertarian Alliance meeting held every last Friday of the month at Brian Micklethwait’s place in Pimlico, London. The speaker was samizdata.net contributor David Carr, delivering his views on the Middle East, specifically the Israel-Palestine troubles. It was possibly the most heavily attended Last Friday at Brian’s I have ever seen, literally standing room only… which made the final standing ovations for David’s outstanding talk all the easier 
Standing room only for David’s talk!
Paul Coulam and Adriana Cronin: the intellectual hardcore
Judith Hatton and Amoy Ing: libertarian thought across the generations September 28th, 2002 | 2 comments - (Comments are closed)
Is Britain revolting? According to this report in the Straits Times the British are as MAD as hell and they’re not going to take it anymore.
Strangely, though, not so much as a word about this in the British press. So what’s the score? Was it simply a slow-news day in Singapore, so time for a bit of journalistic licence? Or is it being kept quiet here for fear that publicity will only fuel further civil disobediance? August 25th, 2002 | Comments are closed
 
Two rather different looks for Sarah! If you want to know who and what Sarah Lawrence is – and if you want to know about one of the smartest and most effective libertarian propagandists alive then you do want to know who and what Sarah Lawrence is – then read “The Burqa Incident”, subtitled “How I was expelled from the Libertarian Party convention and (allegedly) narrowly escaped spending the night in jail being interrogated by the FBI”. (This girl is clearly a graduate of the Brian Micklethwait School for Putting Unwieldy But Accurate Titles On All Articles (Or Subtitles If That Is Preferred) So That They Always Know What It’s About And Don’t Have To Guess.) Sarah was due to speak at the Libertarian Party National Convention, held in Indianapolis in July of this year, which she eventually did, on a subject that included “burqa” in its title. So, she thought she’d stir up a little interest for it by walking around beforehand in a burqa. This is an impressive costume (see below). The joke at the centre of this characteristically Sarahesque episode is that when our Sarah, dressed in her burqa, tried to enter the premises being used by the Convention, she completely freaked out the security people, who had been scaring themselves about a possible terrorist attack on just such a place as this (lots of people assembled in one place) for the previous several days. However, this was what they said to her:
As Sarah herself points out, the guy had it the wrong way around. What he was saying was, in effect: if you’re a genuine terrorist then walk right in ma’am and do your worst, but if it is just a stunt and therefore no threat and no problem, go away. It seems that not even someone genuinely suspected because of her costume of perhaps being about to let off a bomb may meanwhile be subjected to insulting and religiously demeaning costume restrictions. I suppose all wars take a bit of getting used to. It must have been rather like this here in England at the end of 1939, when we were still getting used to fighting that war. Let’s hope this war never gets as deadly and as deadly serious as that war did, and remains stuck at the (mostly) farcical stage for the duration. Sarah’s article has also just been published in The Laissez Faire Electronic Times, under an even more accurate title. July 22nd, 2002 | Comments are closed
I would like to say “Well Done” to all the libertarian comrades who attended the Liberty conference at the week-end. I’m sure it was rather tedious, frustrating and confirmed all the usual complaints we have against the leftist so-called defenders of liberty. However the first virtue of attending such events is that it clears up in their minds whether we’re in only favour of the right of our corporate sponsors to screw the poor, or in favour of freedom for white people, or whether we’re serious about liberty. No doubt there are some leftists who come away from an encounter with the Libertarian Alliance with the private realization that actually, they hate freedom if freedom means other people being allowed to choose capitalism as their mode of dealing with the universe. As someone who values truth above delusion I suppose the Libertarian Alliance performs a valuable educational function when it allows fascists to discover their inner selves and come out of the closet. The value of such an exercise is that it makes the claim that libertarians are closet nazis unsustainable. Being accused of being naive utopians is rather an improvement on being falsely associated with every horror of the 20th century. June 11th, 2002 | Comments are closed
Several comments stuck in my mind that were made by speakers at the Liberty Conference on Saturday in central London at which I was present along with David Carr and some other Samizdata and Libertarian Alliance members. The following will not be forgotten easily:
This was uttered by a man who claimed to be a member of Liberty, the civil liberties lobby. Perhaps he should lobby to have that organisation’s name changed to something more appropriate to what he thinks should be its true values, such as ‘Nanny’. As David said, it was not a particularly encouraging event, although a few half-decent contacts were made and a lot of Libertarian Alliance pamphlets were taken away. As with many such events, the best course of action is to behave like a decent human being. However, and at the risk of sounding arrogant, most of the people there did not have the intellectual equipment to figure out the exit route from a damp paper bag. June 10th, 2002 | Comments are closed
Yesterday, I took myself along to a rather dreary and sullen conference hall in Central London to attend the Liberty Conference previously flagged up by Brian. I admit that I was unsure about whether or not to bother going but it was curiosity more than anything else which tipped me in the direction of attendance. An event which was touted as a meeting of minds between socialist ‘rights’ campaigners and capitalist ‘liberty’ campaigners was, I thought, bound to set a few sparks flying and that would be a worthwhile way to spend an otherwise idle Saturday afternoon. Fellow libertarians like Tom Burroughes, Chris Tame and Marc Glendenning clearly felt the same. Sadly, it was a sparkless day. Brian pointed out that Liberty is the re-branded National Council of Civil Liberties which was set up as a Bolshevik front and, I regret to have to say, that the Bolsheviks have left their imprimatur. There was no meeting of minds, no agreements, no breakthroughs, no ideas, no progress and no real debate to speak of. The atmosphere was stultified by stubborn unwillingness to address any issue other than the race and immigration in any depth whatsoever. Mostly though there was an abundance of waffle; waffle, waffle and then some more waffle. Valiant efforts on the part of Tom, Chris and I to raise other issues or inject other memes or even start a meaningful debate fell on stoney ground. We were strangers in a strange land, spectres at the feast and we all felt it. There was, however, some cursory discussion about the terms ‘left’ and ‘right’ and even some agreement that such terms were no longer adequate or even redundant. But ditching outmoded terminology does nothing whatsoever to bridge the yawning gap between those people who think that the world will become a freer, better place with more laissez-faire and those who think that freedom cannot be achieved without state enforced equality and state distributed entitlements. It was the difference between ‘free to’ and ‘free from’ but between those two little words lies a vast ocean. It wasn’t just a difference in approach. We were two sets of people who simply saw the world through a whole different set of lenses. I came away with the feeling that the whole day was not so much an attempt to reach out to libertarians for new ideas but more an attempt to gather us into the big tent and thereby neutralise us. In a way this is actually quite good news. It means that they not only are aware of us but are frightened of us. Good. If we can’t join ’em, beat ’em, that’s what I say. And it is in that spirit that I actually decided that it would be a good idea to join them nonethless. It means I can go along to future meetings and make a thorough nuisance of myself by asking lots of discomforting questions. I shall try to plant the seeds from whence some different memes can germinate and whilst I doubt very much that I shall succeed I shall have enough fun in the process to make the relatively modest (and tax deductible) subscription fee worthwhile. I must remember to arm myself with some cream, strawberries and maple syrup though. June 9th, 2002 | Comments are closed
Josh Chafetz over on OxBlog has an interesting post about the nature of order, touching on Adam Ferguson and Adam Smith but mostly about Fred Hayek. He also brings up a useful point about a Pejman Pundit post ridiculing the idea of an anarchy club. In a later posting Pejman insists he does understand the definition of the word ‘anarchy’ and points out his first posting was mostly in jest. There is indeed a useful point being made here and one I have made to several Libertarian Alliance members before: we understand what we mean when we say ‘anarchy’ but when the term is used in common parlance, it is generally a synonym for ‘nihilism’. For example when a bunch of scruffy self-described anti-globalisation protestors set fire to a MacDonalds in Paris and smash up a Mercedes parked near by, those so-called ‘anarchists’ are not doing those things because they want more kosmos (spontaneous or natural order) and less taxis (imposed order), leading to a morality based anarcho-capitalist golden age… no, they are mostly just nihilists whose vision of the future is little different from that of the bikers from hell in the movie ‘Mad Max’. The few of them who actually do have a semi-coherent idea of what the future should look like are Spanish style (circa 1938) ‘anarcho-syndicalists’… which is to say they are rather like meat eating vegetarians (see the ‘related article’ link below). It is for this reason I usually urge libertarians to stay away from the ‘A’ word because it is so widely misused. Josh Chafetz also expresses his views about anarchy as an objective that shows he more or less does understand the true nature of what real anarchists are arguing for:
I said more or less understand because taxis does not necessarily mean state imposed order: for example most of the rules within a stock exchange are ‘taxis’ rather than ‘kosmos’ and are analogous to the rules of a private club.. a few are imposed by the state but most are imposed by the exchange itself. No one is forced to trade in a stock exchange and thus in some hypothetical anarchist future, there may well still be ‘taxis’ intensive stock exchanges. However like Josh, I too am not an anarchist. I am a minarchist but where I depart from Josh is that whilst I agree it is probably not possible to depart from a system in which there is a state, I do think it is desirable. In essence I believe in systems involving the one word conspicuous by its absence in this interesting but utilitarian discussion: morality. I believe in objective morality, albeit imperfectly understood and conjecturally proposed. That, rather than the force of state or vox pop, is the one and only source of legitimacy in any system.  Probably not what you had in mind June 8th, 2002 | Comments are closed
Just to make the point that the Liberty Conference on Human Rights, Civil Liberties, etc., this coming Saturday (June 8th), which I mentioned in an earlier post is not just warmed over Bolshevism, Chris Tame flagged the event up on the Libertarian Alliance Forum with the following introductory spiel:
Quite so. I won’t be there myself, even though the Libertarian Alliance (i.e. Chris Tame) offered to pay my entrance fee, but Tom Burroughes has just emailed me saying he will, and that he intends to supply a report for Samizdata. By the way, as not mentioned earlier (and sorry about that), the Conference is in Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, London WC1, starting (as I did mention) at 10 am and going on ’til 4 pm. June 6th, 2002 | Comments are closed
Yesterday four of us stuffed a Libertarian Alliance mailing, chez moi. It will be going out second class mail (don’t ask), on Wednesday (Monday and Tuesday are Golden Jubilee Bank Holidays). Libertarian Alliance publications are written and edited so that they can stand any amount of delay, so I’ll tell you about them when Sean Gabb’s computer is back in business (British Telecom are messing him around royally) and we have them up on the LA website. However, one of the fliers added to the mailing, about a conference next Saturday organised by Liberty (formerly the National Council for Civil Liberties) will hit hall carpets a lot later than would have been desirable. This conference is bizarrely entitled “Human Rights v Civil Liberties”. What’s the “v” about? I guess by “Human Rights” they mean robbing people to pay for other peoples’ education, hospital treatment, etc. But the worst things about the conference are that you have to pay GBP35 to get in, and that it starts at 10 am (lasting until 4 pm.) That’ll keep the riff-raff away, including me. Maybe Tom Burrroughes – wearing his Reuters hat? – can talk his way in for a better price, and at a time to suit himself. The “Workshop” subjects give you the flavour: “Hunting, Shooting, Fishing: Neglected Freedoms?”, How do Libertarians defend equality?”, “The European Union: A threat to our freedom?”, “Libertarian Right v Liberal Left: Insurmountable differences?” Speakers include: Louise Christian (Christian Fisher Solicitors), Claire Fox (Institute of Ideas), Mark Glendening (Democracy Movement) , Lord Peter Goldsmith QC (the Attorney General), Michael Gove (Times columnist), Imran Khan (solicitor), Claude Moraes (Labour MEP), Professor Conrad Russell (Kings College London), Steven Norris (former deputy chairman of the Conservative Party), Rabinder Singh (Matrix Chambers), and John Wadham of Liberty itself. NCCL, as it was, was started by Bolsheviks for their own entirely Bolshevik reasons, and remains overwhelmingly left-of-centre. But as you may have noticed, three of those four workshop subjects push libertarian buttons, and they are apparently making genuine attempts to extricate themselves from the tag of being Blairite poodles. I asked Sean Gabb if he was going? “Oh no, a bunch of lefties chattering amongst themselves.” And in truth that is probably what it will be. Nevertheless, they are trying. (The Libertarian Alliance is affiliated to them, for its own reasons.) But what do you do if your side is now the ruling class and hence the people now most vigorously violating civil liberties? What do you do if you have friends of friends whom you are now supposed to be campaigning against? What if the man who is now stitching up asylum seekers or fox-hunters came to your wedding? Libertarian Alliance Director Chris Tame will also be one of the speakers at this conference, so he at least will know some of what transpires. Marc Glendening, a long-time anti-EU campaigner, is also a cordial acquaintance. Maybe I’ll be able to extract something in writing from one of them about it all. If you’re interested, ring 020 7378 3667, or email zoe@liberty-human-rights.org.uk June 3rd, 2002 | Comments are closed
Last week, immediately after returning from my trip to France, I visited St Andrews University in Scotland, courtesy of the Liberty Club guys, to speak at a meeting they’d organised. It was all a great pleasure, and not just because the lodgings they shared with me for the night after the meeting are so nicely situated right by the sea or because they are such nice people or because the weather was so nice. Even nicer is that the Liberty Club is doing so well. Universities are vitally important places if you’re in the idea spreading business. You’ve got a clutch of bright people relatively early in their lives, selected for their brightness and put together into a community. And, for once, community really means community. As I wandered about the town with Alex Singleton on the day after the meeting, he kept greeting familiar faces. Messages sent out in one part of the place don’t just meander off into the wild yonder. They double back on themselves, and if you keep on with them you can very quickly dose the entire place. Universities are, to use a word libertarians are particularly fond of, meme machines. So, if you do what the Liberty Club does, and hold a series of different meetings on different topics, and if you get thirty people to each meeting but not always the exact same thirty people, and if libertarianism is the meta-context of the people organising all this, then pretty soon everyone in the university with any interest in such matters gets to hear about libertarianism. You don’t agree with it necessarily, in fact you may disagree with it all the more fiercely on account of understanding it all the better. But for the rest of your life the libertarian attitude is fixed in your head as an attitude that you can have, that other intelligent people do have, and that you could switch to if you ever felt like it. The Liberty Club is one of the most if not the most active student organisation on the entire St Andrews campus. It is (a) definitely libertarian. It is in particular (b) not conservative. And it is in general (c) not stupid. Its leading lights are not thoughtless, unfunnily self-mocking posturers, of the “we don’t mean this really we’re just students arsing about” variety. They give off vibes of philosophical and political passion and intelligence. Their Liberty Log is a modest operation, with bits appearing only every day or two rather than every hour or two as here. Before leaving I contributed a piece to it concerning the meeting I spoke at, and there’s only been one further posting (by Marian Tupy) since then. But that’s a pace they can sustain, and their web activity (see also their website), is but the seasoning of the philosophical and intellectual dish they are serving up to their local target community. The meal itself is face to face contact and face to face argument and public debate. What their internet activity does is add a few more libertarian memes to an already meme-rich environment, and supply heavyweight back-up for any who want to pursue libertarianism further, either to agree with it or to attack it. Like all capable people, the St Andrews Liberty Clubbers worry that they could be doing better. Couldn’t we all? Alex mentioned setting up some kind of organisation for reaching students everywhere, and that might make sense if it could be done without too much strain. But I’d say that what they’re already doing is a model to libertarian groups in colleges and universities everywhere. And thanks to the internet, others really can look and learn. My bet is that they’ve already “infected” several other campuses without even realising it. April 22nd, 2002 | Comments are closed
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