I've listened to quite a few podcasts but I'm sure there's a lot I don't know and understand about all of what Stef says. All of his political stuff I've read about before and the thing I like best about this site is that he's now translating all the ideas in libertarian/anarchist minded books into audio and video form. This will help the ideas reach a lot more people because I've learned over the years that lots of folks just don't want to take the time to read like I do. So I guess the only thing that bothers me about this point is that I think it would be good for Stef to refer to the individuals and books that these ideas came from. Then maybe more people will be interested enough to go to those sources and check them out. I thought about this recently when I was looking up something in my dog eared copy of Murray Rothbard's For a New Liberty and I found a place where he was saying 'there is no such thing as the government,' that it's just an abstract concept. I guess my thought around this is that books often have lots of footnotes as to where some ideas and comments originated from and how does one do that with podcasts.
I have mixed feelings on the podcasts about family and parenting. I think there are a lot of individual experiences and variations in our lives and so some of the things Stef proposes just seem too harsh to those of us who did not have similar upbringings. As a matter of fact, the variety in our lives is similar to what freedom loving people believe about the free market, there are many, many paths to figuring out how you want to handle your own family life and there's no right way. And sometimes if you just stick around, you will see some very satisfying and gratifying changes in other people. I have two examples to share. I was spanked a few times as a child and it affected me. I decided not to spank my children and to raise them differently in other ways. I did not feel a need to defoo from my parents, I just feel like they raised us with the information they had and I happened to meet people and read books that shared other ideas that made more sense so I went with those. And here's the interesting part: as I moved through my parenting, it became obvious that we were not using spanking and one day my dad asked me about it. He was curious to learn more and found it interesting. I don't think he really thought it would work but then he saw how it was turning out and became more open minded about it. If I had just left and had no contact with him, that would not have happened. I went through something similar when I decided to homeschool especially with my brother. But when he started to see the evidence of how my kids were turning out, he admitted it was not a bad idea. He even wrote me a letter apologizing for his past comments. I guess my point here is that if it just doesn't feel right to totally defoo, you don't have to, all you need to do is have the confidence to hold your ground on what is right and perhaps you will have similar things happen. So I'm only saying that there are an infinite number of ways this can turn out and it reflects the individual life experiences we all have from the beginning of our lives.
As to the idea that those (the average trapped citizen) who just sticks with our government system being evil, I can't quite grasp that either. Many times it's just pragmatism and self-defense that make people do what they do even though they see the system is just plain wrong and it's not working. And they usually don't want to think about whether it's immoral or not because they can't do a damn thing about it. Many people I've communicated with would love it if the force were gone, but it's not. And none of us knows how to stop it. I do think Stef might be on a good track as he's trying to get the young people to get to a place where they understand all of this before they have kids and then if the kids are raised differently, maybe one day good things will happen to society as a whole.
The last thing that's bothering me relates to my second paragraph and my past personal experiences I guess because it has to do with patience in helping others to change their ways of thinking. I notice that people get banned here or are told to leave when all I see is that they are new and asking questions to try and understand things better. If no one here has the patience to talk to these people and help them stick around so they can learn more, then what's the point? If this is not the point, then should this board be closed to the public and have some sort of process that people would go through before they were accepted? I'm just confused about the forum aspect of this website.
Debbie