Archives for March 2007

Whenever it happens that I get into a conversation about public policy, the law, enforcement, and the State in general, It’s quite the norm that in one form or another, I’m told that we need these various laws in order to prevent the various predations that go on round and about.

My first query is usually to ask what laws are preventing them from being a bad person. Who would they victimize, in what way, and what would they steal if there were no laws? And most people immediately see where that’s going, but the point, of course, it to draw the distinction that when people talk about the necessity of law and enforcement, they’re always talking about the "need" to rein in other people, not themselves.

I have an answer for that, too, and it’s a simple one: I’m willing to take my chances. That’s it. You see, I’m not denying at all that there exists risk from predators, but the real problem with the standard argument for the State as concerns various law enforcement is that it begs the question. That is, it assumes a general effectiveness that’s really not in evidence. Simply: we have plenty of predation now, in the face of thousands of laws, police, courts, prisons, and execution chambers. Even worse, the goings on in despotic State regimes are often touted as a slippery slope, without really realizing that it bolsters my side of the argument: the worst of the criminals are always part of the state. That has forever been true.

Think about that. The worst, most vile predators you can imagine have for centuries been part of the nation-state, and even before that got into full swing, it was still about massive conquest of one culture or region over another, all under some form of political organization.

The simple fact of the matter is that you’re paying — under threat of imprisonment if you don’t — to support a system that’s supposed to protect you from predation. Moreover, I’m being forced to pay, because that’s your value, not mine; and you don’t want to take your own chances, so you have the State steal from me, like a predator, in hopes that you won’t be preyed upon. But the State doesn’t really deter anyone; and I dare to assert that the only effective deterrent is what a potential victim — or a victim’s friends and family — might do. The State just sweeps up the mess. Then it takes a report: in order to compile statistics to be used in justifying even more theft, in order to feed and grow the cancer that is the police. And this is all only when the State, itself, isn’t the predator in the first place.

In the end, your best chance at avoiding victimization is to use your mind. It’s your chief tool of survival; so who you associate with, who you support, who you do business with, who your work for, where you live, where you travel, and what neighborhoods you traverse are immeasurably more important risk factors for whether you’ll ever be a victim. State protection is a fantasy. Worse: it’s an oxymoron. What do you want to bet this family would agree with me?

The man leveled his gun at Nicole Thompson’s face.

Moments later, he had the mother of four on the ground with the
barrel to the back of her head. According to her and her husband, the
man screamed, "If you move, I’ll shoot you in the f– head!"

It is an experience she can’t get out of her mind. The gunman, it
turned out, was a cop. And the whole thing – 12 armed officers storming
the family’s split-level Spring Lake Park house – was a big
misunderstanding.

And how about the family of this man?

The witnesses
said Hale shook violently from the charge, as if sitting on an electric
chair. His right hand came out of the front of his sweat shirt and was
shaking violently.

Seconds later, police repeated their command for Hale to show them his hands, and they Tasered him a second time.

Mixson and others said Hale, who was still seated on the steps, rolled onto his left side and vomited into a flower bed.

"My brother yelled at the police that this was overkill. That this
was crazy," Mixson said. "They told him to ‘shut … up,’ or they’d
show him overkill."

Hale rolled back to his right, into a sitting position, still shaking, and police Tasered him a third time, Mixson said.

When Hale, still convulsing, was unable to comply with another request to show police his hands, they killed him.

All just another day’s work here in the [police "protected"] "Land of the Free."

Oh, yea: you’re damn right I’d take my chances. Any day. Thugs, I can generally avoid, and if I can’t, I’d be happy to take responsibility for necessary violence into my own hands. The State, I can’t avoid, and nothing has a greater appetite for murder and mayhem than the State. Nothing that has ever existed is as destructive, or as evil.