Stop Lying to Yourself

I just finished reading (well, listening to) Stefan Molyneux's On Truth: The Tyranny of Illusion last night. While the author's style seems a little tedious at times, bordering on redundant, it may simply be because I am very often exposed to his work, and thus it feels like he's beating me over the head simply because that's what it takes for most people to truly grasp the shocking evils disguised as normalcy.

The theme of the book, though, made me think about this presidential election, which was a big pain in my ass. I started out with the Ron Paul crew, and following his defeat in the primaries, quickly grew accustomed to the futility of statism by listening to Molyneux's podcasts. Consequently, when the time came to vote on the President, I was a card-carrying Voluntaryist, and glad to be rid of the soul-crushing lesser-of-evils game.

The frustrating part was all the direct criticism I got from the people around me for not voting - some of my friends actually got angry at me. I never had a very compelling way to quickly argue my case. It's not easy for people like me to "make sense" to everyone in mainstream society, because even if they agree with me, I inevitably get stuck at how to implement my ideology, and they go back to voting for one of the members of the diverse selection of tyrants every election season.

It would be much easier if, as a reaction to injustices all over the world and particularly in the U.S., I became a socialist. Politicians LOVE socialists, whether they say so or not, and most socialists don't look outside the political realm to seek their end. By appealing to the sentiments of socialists, politicians gain control of sectors of various influence and wealth. Furthermore, like most individuals, socialists fail to see the gun in the room (the government), and go straight after the corporations, which are hardly innocent, but couldn't exercise the exploitation they now enjoy without the government as a lead blocker and a safety net.

Here's the thing. It's absolutely insane to think your vote matters, but to get mad at me for not using my vote is a new level of insanity. Let's be clear, though, even though this is a plain fact, I still get it. When I was a Ron Paul supporter I was extraordinarily pissed that more people didn't vote for him. Since then, though, I've been breaking down the absurd illusions that I've entertained for 20-some odd years.

Now, watching people carefully consider who to use their precious vote on is hilarious to me.

If you are like my friends and I, and are not part of any major union, your vote does not matter, and it certainly isn't a virtue or a responsibility, and here are some reasons why:

1. Statistically, clearly, it doesn't matter. Let's be serious, I don't think Swing Vote is ever going to become a reality.
2. Votes get lost, misread, miscounted, who knows, maybe even hacked nowadays.
   
3. Your voting operates under the assumption that the candidate is going to actually do what they say they are going to do (epic fail)
4. There are so many more bought-and-paid-for (so to speak) voters than any well-intentioned "vigilant" citizenry could hope to offset.
   
5. The whole affair hinges on the idea that (basically) whoever wins more votes than the other, is that the "people have spoken" and that's who they want in power. Clearly, everyone else is getting screwed over, because they're now going to be forced to comply with the decisions of the candidate elected.
   
6. The system implies that having a president is a good/necessary thing. This is especially pertinent in that the role of a president is now VERY different than it used to be
   
7. The president can't simply undo all of the evils of a previous administration. Tyrant though he may be, he still doesn't have quite that much power...yet. If he did, he would be a dictator, and we'd be totally fucked. I'm actually not positive that we're not really damn close to this kind of situation.
   

You'd be better off using your time to write your congressperson. What a joke that is.

Anyways, I don't talk about this kind of stuff because I was just that upset by my critics. I bring it up and make a big deal out of it because it's this kind of delusion that perpetuates the sick fantasy of government. It's astounding, and it's all around us. Every new election cycle there's so much hope and resolution, and then we come to find it's the same old shit, but usually worse. Every government program enacted "with good intentions" creates a massive bureaucracy and unnecessary drag on taxpayers. Then when it fails, the answer is always the same: "There's not enough funding" or "not enough oversight," when the program was already funded in an unbelievably inefficient and exorbitant way, and layered in mind-numbing bureaucracy.

It's a joke. It's a fucking joke. But it's the least funny joke in the history of the world.

So go ahead and vote, but do yourself a favor and stop thinking that it's going to make a positive difference, and for god's sake don't come after me thinking I'm going the wrong direction just because the rest of you have been marching off a cliff for centuries.