I Changed My Mind

Since I was 16 years old, I was a libertarian. Well, I actually hadn’t heard of the term “libertarian” yet, but I certainly held the libertarian ideals dear. Ayn Rand’s “The Fountainhead” was the book that introduced me to the philosophy of liberty and helped illustrate just how corrupt politicians and government can be...if they are given power. It made sense to me, that our individual human endeavours should not be bridled by the chains of political tyranny so long as we don’t use our freedom to diminish someone else’s. It wasn’t until I was 18 though, and eligible to vote for the first time in a presidential election, that I discovered Harry Browne and the Libertarian party in 1996. The Libertarian party was the only party the accurately articulated what I wanted: small government, maximum freedom.

Libertarianism is attractive because it values freedom above all else. It is the philosophy of the wild west: Don’t tread on me. Live and let live. It is the philosophy of the creative, hard working, intellectual. To be a libertarian is to accept full responsibility for your own life through thick and thin. It means that you choose to reap all the benefits of freedom...and to suffer it’s cruelty too. I liked libertarianism because it didn’t try to coddle me. It didn’t lie. It didn’t claim to solve every problem in the world with a political soundbite. It allowed individuals to solve their own problems.

The trouble with this of course, is that it appears that only a small percentage of the people on our planet have the ammunition (or indeed, the food and water) to “solve” their own problems. We still have billions of desperate individuals living in poverty or far below it. We still have billions of people that simply don’t have access to education or medicine or food (or justice) because they simply can’t afford it. Because they don’t have money.

And most of them will never have the opportunity to acquire money. Our monetary system which is controlled by powerful governments and corporations won’t allow that. I’d like to believe that they cling to this powerhouse, not because they are malicious, but because it’s a habit. It’s kind of sad, really. Evil isn’t a tactic, it’s just all some people know. And this is the chief reason that I can no longer, in good conscience, be a libertarian or a capitalist, or indeed, support politics of any gender, ever again.

I’ve found something better. Way better. A real solution. A non political solution. A solution that appeals to my love of science and technology.

It’s crazy. But it’s not. That’s what kills me. It’s so perfect, that it seems like it can’t be right...that it’s all just another Utopian fantasy. That it’s all just a silly dream. What’s strange, though, is that every single person that I’ve talked to and explained this “strange” idea to...really loves it. They think it’ll never happen, but they love it. They’re on board if it does happen. They’re excited...if it happens. They’re skeptical...but they smile when they envision it. They want it to happen, but they carefully resign themselves to it not happening. The world is a cruel place, and the show must go on.

But the show sucks. We all know it. We are killing our planet. We are killing each other. Our behavior is irrational and absurd. We are all in this motherfucker together. Why are we fighting each other? Seriously. It’s suicidal.

When humans first regarded their own intelligence, it became quickly apparent to them that working together in tribes would enhance their survival and their happiness. Obviously a family and a group of friends makes for better survival than lone individuals roughing the elements without support.

So why is it that we choose to separate ourselves from everyone else in the world to our own peril? Why is it that rather than expand our tribes, our corporations, our states, our countries, our continents into one...we choose to stand alone, like selfish, silly, beasts? Beasts that will end up devouring ourselves to spite our neighbors and our planet. Our philosophy of lonely individualism is flawed. It may be solemn and poetic. But it is doomed.

We are all doomed.

Unless we come together.

Why am I being so melodramatic? Because I realize that beginning to care about the planet, about my fellow human beings, and myself...is really damn important. I want to live. I want to live a full and abundant life...but not at the expense of 90% of the planet. Our planet, is full of perpetual abundance...but only if we can learn to work together and utilize its resources efficiently and symbiotically.

We already have unlimited energy in the sun, the wind, the wave, the geothermal song of our earth...it’s all there for us in infinitely, 100% renewable fashion. Energy is abundant.

We already have the technology and the wherewithall to literally feed every single person on this planet, delicious, healthy, food. Food is abundant.

We already have the materials to house and clothe every human on this planet with shelters built out of 100% renewable materials. Shelter is abundant.

We already have the technology to cure or abate almost every “deadly” or debilitating disease on the planet. Medicine and technology is abundant.

The only thing that isn’t abundant. The only thing holding our planet back...is money.

But money is fake. It is created out of the imaginations of “rich” governments and their “wealthy” overlords. All the interest you pay, is also fake. It can’t, in fact, truly be paid back unless the government prints more fake money so that there is enough money in the money supply to cover these interest charges.

Think about it. If the government prints up $1,000...and that’s all the money that up to now, they’ve ever printed, how is it that they can rightly ask for interest on their loans (for their fake money)? Let’s say that they loan a thousand bucks to some poor smuck with a 10% interest rate. Where does that extra 10% come from when the poor smuck needs to pay back the principal and the interest? The government will have to print up another $100 just to create the money that the poor smuck needs to cover the interest payment and the principal. Trouble is, although the government does print up billions of dollars every year without any regard to inflation, they never print up enough money to actually cover all the principal debt plus interest. In fact, I doubt there’s enough money in circulation just to cover the principal. Money, is a giant ponzi scheme that now largely exists inside of computers as digital numbers. And eventually it’s all going to collapse.

Money served its purpose for a few millenniums. But now it’s time to abandon it. Money, today, only holds us back. At least 80% of people on our planet live on less that $10 a day. Our planet has plenty of food and shelter and energy and technology...but most people can’t afford all of these resources. They don’t have enough of our fake, printed-out-of-thin-air, money. Sorry about their luck.

And that’s what life on planet earth is today. It’s a god damned lottery. Most people lose. A very small minority wins. These winners happen to be born on top of some of the earth’s really great resources...or they happened to grow up with enough money to afford them all the opportunities money can buy...or both. Usually both.

It’s bullshit. And the worst part is...if we all really did work together, we really could ALL have everything that we wanted. There’s plenty...so long as we don’t artificially create scarcity. So long as we stop lending credit to money, which is pure, 100%, nonsense.

My ideas about how to make politics, and indeed, the planet, a better place...were all nonsense too. Libertarianism. Capitalism. Any of these ideas are flawed from the start. They assume money is the best way to distribute resources. They are wrong. Money makes everything inefficient, corruptible, and downright dirty.

After I watched The Zeitgeist Addendum, my mind was changed. Everything changed for me actually. It’s hard not to agree that our system is flawed. It’s hard not to agree that a resource based economy is a better model than our current system. After watching that movie, it blew my mind that I was so quickly able to change what I thought was a very unchangeable mind.

I knew then, that if I was able to change my normally inflexible mind, then there must be others out there capable and willing to do the same. I hope you’re one of them. Watch the "Zeitgeist Addendum". Watch "Zeitgeist: Moving Forward." Change your mind about everything. Change the world.