Agora - Let one be like one thousand.

[memenode]

I find it interesting how deep a connection can be between Liberty and self improvement. Before I found out about voluntaryism and became one myself I was reading and blogging about self improvement and self empowerment. Where this topic got linked to the issue of Liberty was probably when I've read "1984" back in January. Just as I've finished reading, I had a moment which I still remember, because I wrote my thoughts down. In fact, it was an idea inspired by that book, that by "being real self thinking, inquisitive, exploratory humans we can overt any threat of dystopian future" and the intended message was: "Be as human as possible and you'll be free."

It was a message to myself, but also to the potential audience of a site whose name I came up with on that occasion: DoublePlusHuman. As I wrote there "the name is a reference to 1984's Newspeak and translates as Super Human".

That's where I saw a strong link between pursuit of liberty and pursuit of self growth. People who don't strive to improve themselves, starting with the most fundamental element of self, their mind, are much less likely to bother with pursuit of true Liberty, and are sadly consequently much more susceptible to manipulation by those who pursue power over them, inevitably depriving them of their liberty, by inducing their obedience through fear and related tactics.

I consider myself an agorist today, in terms of strategy I believe to be best for bringing liberty into common practice. Even as a libertarian I am a minority, but as a voluntaryist and agorist I'm probably in super minority. However, I also feel in a sense privileged and empowered. In parallel I've been discovering ways of improving my own self and freeing my mind. I know so much more about liberty, about how to be free regardless of what the world outside is like and about how to attain wealth and happiness. I believe that I've come to the posession of insights that are like a secret gold mine, secret not because it's hidden, but because so many people simply ignore it that it's just not in their view.

So what I am getting at is this. We may be a minority, but with the insights that we have a single one of us can be worth a one thousand of the rest. We have the power because we know what the world outside the matrix looks like. If I may say so, we are all Neo's, The One's. We can accomplish so much more than most of them, still living in blissful ignorance.

I suggest agorists to grow their mentality rich. Let every agorist be an entrepreneur. Go read "Think and Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill and then use the insights therein to grow your ability to achieve and super-achieve anything that you set your mind to. I've already started. I've set my purpose to be the most significant growth of my online business ever, to a point that's getting "dangerosly close" to financial freedom. I wont go into specifics, but the ultimate desired outcome is to get wealthy, seriously wealthy - the biggest reason being that wealth equals capacity to achieve even more. Let's face it, it's hard to achieve a lot if all you have is enough money to merely get by. If we're to build our agora, we ought to start commanding a much greater amount of resources than that.

Ideally, we should all grow into millionaires, and if you aren't one, plan to become one, and start now! Find your passion, see how can you serve the masses with your abilities and go for it!

[FTL_Ian]

I'm with you dude.  Everyone can be a Neo if they so choose.

[David]

Quote"I consider myself an agorist today, in terms of strategy I believe to be best for bringing liberty into common practice. Even as a libertarian I am a minority, but as a voluntaryist and agorist I'm probably in super minority. "
Agreed.  I think agorism is the only way it will ever happen. 
On your point about being a minority, while I agree that we are a principled agorist, in function, many, argurably a small majority are agorists.  When a guy chooses to reject authority and smoke weed, he is living free.  When the millions in every nation that tax evade, they are living free.  Not perfect, and there is no 'grand principle' or focus, but in function, they are commiting civ. dis, and even though they may be statists, if they are not voting, and actively supporting the state, I would see them as allies. 

[memenode]

I fully agree, as Samuel Edward Konkin 3, or SEK3 as he was known online, said, agorism is recognized by action primarily. So when you act in civil disobedience you are an agorist. When you are acting in support and cooperation with the state you're a statist. This does mean that even us who call ourselves agorists are perhaps at some times acting like statists (if we decide to obey temporarily to avoid a particular threat), but the ideal, of course, is to act like agorists 100% of the time, and this will be easiest when we're able to actually start building protected agorist firms. So the alternative police force is the first step and NH seems like the most likely place for it to emerge.

Cheers

[John Edward Mercier]

Do you mean a security agency?

[memenode]

Yeah, or the defense agency or whatever it's best called. It's purpose is to offer an alternative protection service to that offered by the government's police. And it would come most useful, naturally, to agorists starting new agorist businesses.

I'd have to remind myself of the exact steps from the New Libertarian Manifesto that have to be taken before the actual establishment of the defense agency becomes prudent.

[K. Darien Freeheart]

That's kind of a catch 22, I think. Konkin said that defense systems (not just police, but secured entry points, and more relevant today than when he wrote it, video surveilance) would need to arise in order to sustain larger agorist systems. He didn't exactly lay out when those systems should/would arise but he did strongly caution that use of them to challenge the existing and percieved "legitimate" people would be a devastating failure.

I can see how small scale agorist outlets (individual business ventures) would arise, but I'm curious as to how they'd happen mainstream. I can see "off the record" trucking for instance, but there comes a point where the agora and the "real" market begin to conflict - for instance, how would agorism eventually operate non-coercive roadways without coming that armed conflict with the government's armed people, or shooting down planes or the like.

I'm now reminded of the "Co-op" in the Left Behind series.

[AnarcSyn]

while checking the latest news from the convention fronts i found this link:

Agorists at the RNC
"The following flyer, along with other market anarchist material, is to be handed out to Ron Paul supporters in Minneapolis...."

http://darianworden.com/blog/?p=55


after reading a bit about Agorists, and bits of the New Libertarian Manifesto, i'm concerned about the possibility of 2 differing security forces representing two differing agorist communities possibly getting into a major tiff over any kind of enforcement matters involving the 2 communities...

anyway, more on that later.......