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What is Liberty?

learnmoreLliberty is the unencumbered ability to choose for ourselves what we (as free, sovereign individuals) do with our own lives, bodies, labor, and property; to accept responsibility for those choices; and to refrain from aggressing against others without just cause.

If you were the only person in the world, you could do anything you wanted to with the caveat that you and you alone were responsible for the consequences of your actions. Every resource would belong to you and you alone. If you ate wild plants and got sick, jumped off a tree and broke your leg, sat around instead of hunting and preparing your food thus going hungry that day, you'd only have yourself to blame.

In the real world, however, no man is an island. With the introduction of another person into the equation, let alone the billions of us now sharing the same resources and elbow room, problems begin to develop of Biblical proportions. (Think Cain and Abel here, folks.)

 

How to Co-Exist Without Violence and Coercion?

With the introduction of other people into our paradigm of one, a number of problems develop, namely the 8 Real Crimes:

  1. Murder (destruction of another's life/body)
  2. Assault (damage of another's body)
  3. Rape (invasion of another's body in a sexual manner)
  4. Kidnap (theft of another's body)
  5. Slavery (theft another's labor)
  6. Theft (theft of another's property)
  7. Vandalism (destruction or damage of another's property)
  8. Trespass (invasion of another's property)

 

In order to co-exist peacefully with each other rather than living like violent savages pillaging each other and blaming others for our own bad choices ("It's your fault the bees stung me when I whacked that beehive with a stick!"), we must come to some basic agreement on how best to interact with each other, some basic rules for behavior that allow us to co-exist and interact peaceably with each other. In the libertarian, voluntaryist or "pro-liberty" movement, we call this set of ethical rules of behavior the Philosophy of Liberty.

Historically, around the world, the simplest and greatest of these ethical rules has been what we now refer to as The Golden Rule aka the Ethic of Reciprocity. In ancient Egypt, it was described as "That which you hate to be done to you, do not do to another". In ancient Greece, Pittacus stated it as "Do not to your neighbor what you would take ill from him." The most famous reference is Jesus of Nazareth's "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Throughout many religions and philosophies, this has been a common principle. From Christianity, Islam and Judaism to Buddhism, Hinduism and Humanism, the Golden Rule is a global ethic based on a simple logical statement: What goes around comes around... so don't be a jerk. Regardless of your spiritual beliefs (or lack thereof), the logic is unassailable

Another important ethic in the Philosophy of Liberty is the Non-Aggression Principle (NAP) which holds that "aggression" -- defined as the initiation of physical force, the threat of such, or fraud upon persons or their property -- is inherently illegitimate because it is unjust and irrational. In contrast to pacificism, the non-aggression principle does not preclude defense of one's self or the defense of others.

 

A Wellspring of Liberty: The Four Basic Rights

With the purpose of harmony among peaceful people and to avoid the 8 Real Crimes, the Philosophy of Liberty and it's accompanying ethics states that in order for this to be possible, each individual must allow every other individual the same basic freedoms or "Rights" they themselves possess as a free Human being: 

  1. You are a sovereign individual and thus you hold sole dominion over your life and the consequences of your actions both positive and negative.
  2. Because you own your life, you own your body.
  3. Because your own your body, you own the output of your body aka your labor.
  4. Because you own your labor, you own the fruits of your labor and thus the property you have created or honestly acquired through trade.

 

Freedom is Sane, Tyranny is Madness

To deny the first statement is to claim that you are nothing more than a sheep, an animal without free will, absent of control over your life, liberty, labor and property.

To deny the second statement is to claim that others have a right to do with your body as they wish, without your consent. They can assault, rape, imprison or murder you without consequence.

To deny the third statement is to claim that others have a right to enslave you, reaping the rewards of your labor without consequence.

To deny the fourth statement is to claim that others may take, vandalize, or trespass against your property without consequence.

All of these denials are the product of an irrational mind and thus null and void.

 

 

For more information and far more in-depth perspectives, we present several resources below:

 

 

Visit these websites to learn more about the philosophy of liberty and find out what's happening in the liberty movement: