Oppression by Perception By Larken Rose

[Guest FroggyOne2]

These days I get more and more messages from people expressing one

sentiment: "Okay, so government sucks, but without it, how would we

protect ourselves from crooks, thieves, gangs and invading armies?"

In fact, it seems that the worse "government" gets, the more some

people scream that NOT having one at all would make things even

worse. And some insist that even if we did away with the

"government" we have now, another one--probably even worse--would

just grow in its place. Scary gangs would take over, and grow into

new tyrannies.

What all such predictions and concerns fail to take into account is

that today, oppression is about 5% the result of the thugs who

claim to act on behalf of "government," and 95% the result of what

is in the minds of the oppressed.

Don't believe me? Imagine you were a nasty guy, and were given the

following challenge: You would get 100,000 thugs to do your

bidding, and a bunch of money, and you had to rob 100,000,000

people of half of what they earned, over and over again, year after

year.

Already the odds are hugely against you: your intended victims

outnumber your thugs a THOUSAND to one. This won't be easy. (Even

Navy Seals wouldn't like those odds.) But wait, it gets worse. Only

10,000 of your thugs have any weapons. And the other 90,000 are not

only unarmed, but most of them are overweight middle-aged women, or

90-pound office nerds, who aren't really excited about the job to

begin with. Now what are your chances? Oh, and by the way, about

HALF of your intended victims are armed.

So, think you could do it?

Not a chance. UNLESS...

If you can somehow dupe your victims into feeling a moral

OBLIGATION to hand over their money--if you can make them perceive

your demands as somehow legitimate, and make them view disobedience

to you as a sin--then you might be able to pull it off.

And then you'd be called the "Internal Revenue Service."

The power of "government" to oppress does NOT come from brute force

alone; it comes from the indoctrination of the masses into

believing that the tyrants are "authority"--that they have the

RIGHT to rob ("tax") people, the RIGHT to boss people around

("regulate" them), the RIGHT to kidnap ("imprison") people who

disobey, and so on. Without the VICTIMS of oppression imagining

their own oppression to be "legal," and therefore justified, it

would take a LOT more brute force to keep them in line--far more

brute force, in fact, than could be funded by what was stolen from

them.

The notion of "government" is the belief that certain people have

the RIGHT to steal, assault, harass, control and murder. As long as

that belief exists in the minds of the public, then yes, removing

any particular gang calling itself "government" would accomplish

nothing. A new group of thugs would take its place, and become the

new "authority." But if you remove the BELIEF--which is what I and

others are trying so hard to do--tyranny is FINISHED.

There are somewhere around 90,000,000 gun owners in this country.

That number is 30 times bigger than the entire Chinese army. Armed

civilians here outnumber all "law enforcement" and military

personnel by a huge margin. The American people CANNOT be ruled by

brute force alone, not by any foreign power, not by any local gang,

not by anyone on this planet. The ONLY way to oppress them is by

doing what the American tyrants do today: convince the people that

the oppression is legitimate, by calling it "law" and "authority."

And if you can make your victims think that you have the RIGHT to

rob and control them, it doesn't matter at all how strong they are,

what weapons they have, or how many of them there are.

Without the myths of "legality" and "authority" legitimizing their

actions, the current tyrants here could never in a million years

force compliance. If the people as a whole didn't believe in the

notion of "taxes"--legitimate theft which is immoral to resist--the

IRS would be gone tomorrow. A few might get beaten up or killed,

and the rest would immediately resign.

Likewise, if the people as a whole didn't imagine that "law"

legitimizes what the DEA and ATF do, those agencies would also be

gone tomorrow. (If you doubt it, imagine a non-"government" gang of

a few thousand thugs going around doing armed invasions of houses

to take away all alcohol. How long do you suppose that would last?

Try to get between Americans and their beer, and things will get

ugly.)

Ever since the advent of firearms, the thing that most determines

whether tyranny will occur is how the tyrants' victims PERCEIVE the

situation. If the victims perceive their attackers to be

"government" and "authority," and perceive their demands to be

legitimate "laws," the victims will feel a moral OBLIGATION to be

victimized. Then they will talk about how PROUD they are to have

been victimized! (That's exactly what Americans do when they brag

about being "law-abiding taxpayers.")

But if the intended victims do NOT view the attacks as legitimate,

the tyrants are finished. In a land where that many people have

guns, even though isolated incidents of robbery and assault are

still possible, brute force alone could NEVER be used to oppressive

the people on any large scale, or for any significant amount of

time.

The American people already have the MEANS to resist, but as long

as they believe in "government," they will not have the WILL to

resist the biggest thugs around. As long as the belief in

"authority" survives, there will be a never-ending supply of evil

bastards ready to fill the void. But once the "government" myth

falls--once the people no longer hallucinate some robbery and

assault to be LEGITIMATE (because it's "legal" and done by

"government")--then tyranny is dead, and no amount of brute force

could ever rebuild it.

Larken Rose

http://www.larkenrose.com

(If there are some people you know who need to be persuaded to stop

condoning their own enslavement--and YOUR enslavement--try getting

them a copy of "The Iron Web" at the above link)

[Guest 3pugguy]

That's something to think about and what really scares me is the truth inherent in the piece.

Not unlike the smiling salesman, who pats you on the back while picking your pocket with the other hand.

Seeing the President's "speech" tonight did not make me any more comfortable about the growth of government, either (nor do his picks for advisors, etc).

[Guest ArmyVeteran37214]

Everyone should watch: The 861 Evidence

Wake Up People!

Edited September 10, 2009 by StreetWK05