As a writer for this site, it never ceases to amuse me how some people respond to the content here. I get a firsthand account of all of it, and a lot of people’s responses to it are emblematic of the propagandized culture in which we live. There are so many people who criticize things without fully understanding them, and it’s never clearer than when somebody writes a full article, and somebody else thinks that a few paragraphs are going to refute the whole thing. Or worse, when somebody doesn’t even read them, but still offers an opinion on it, as though the uninformed opinion of an unread mind is somehow adequate fuel against a post with many points to discuss.

And it’s not just here either, with social media in general causing a scourge of people who have an inflated opinion of their opinions. Enter substack, an email newsletter service which offers people the ability to create their own newsletter and curate an audience for that newsletter. It’s actually a reasonable idea, and I might get one at some point. But a lot of the people who have them use those in order to make truly horrendous points, or speak on some topic to their closed audience to applause. No matter how many grammatical or logical errors there are, or how well punctuated it was.

That’s where the subject of today’s post comes in. Somebody decided to respond to the founder of this place with a truly terrible piece that he admitted was nothing more than potshots in the title. Brandon Aragon wrote a list of reasons not to get involved in the political process as a libertarian, and somebody with whom I’ve had experience decided to respond to that post with some truly intellectually bereft responses. I read through it, and both my previous experience with this person, and this post, created an irritation that I couldn’t quite surmount, so I decided to throw my hat in the ring and make a response post of my own. Responding to a response might seem petty, but this guy wants to try to indict our entire philosophy by saying what he’s saying, so if all I’m doing is indicting his post, based on his current and previous statements, then I guess I’m in exactly the space he is, but unlike him, speaking from knowledge, logic, and most importantly, consistency.

The author of the piece, LB Muniz, titles the piece, “Friendly potshots at Agorism,” and then immediately gets unfriendly by subtitling it “When dogma replaces consistency.”

First off, this kind of well-poisoning might seem cute in the draft stage (which is clearly the stage he missed with the litany of typographical errors contained therein), but it’s anything but friendly. It’s designed to immediately rig somebody’s mentality against what’s being presented…so is the text in the image that would be shared with the article.

Immediately, he claims a sense of superiority by saying, “The river is consistent and shapes the world. The rock is dogmatic and wears away.” I think you can guess who he fancies himself to be already – setting himself up as the intellectual Superior already isn’t a good start. Neither is claiming that he’s wearing away at some rock. It’s an unfriendly way to start from hostile ground, and imply that his argument is as manifestly true as physics or nature. His hubris is undue, as the rest of this piece shows.

Now just to be clear, I’m not some paragon of friendly interaction. I’ve been accurately referred to as the most aggressively negative person on liberty Twitter. My whole deal is giving people a worse day every day, and that’s how I advertise my account. I want people to know what they’re getting into. At the same time, if you do intend to put on some sort of face of friendliness, perhaps you shouldn’t start by immediately claiming that you’re wearing away your opponent, and then proceeding to make the least intellectually honest arguments against what they said. So to get into the actual subject of the post, let’s get started with the first section.

He starts by claiming that he’s generally familiar with the work of Samuel Konkin, and that he agrees that operating outside of the system where possible is a good idea. He includes a notation, and that notation refers to another substack post he made telling people to simply stop being poor, in defense of somebody I’ve already exposed as a fake Christian, who blocked me for having the audacity to share Bible verses in response to his asinine posts.

I’ll get into that more a little bit later, but suffice it to say, I have history with this person, and it’s no surprise that he doesn’t talk about that history. It’s much easier to simply pretend that there was no valid or reasonable criticism with a post and reference it in the future, than it is to include the fact that there might be nuance that you’re intentionally failing to include. As I’ll discuss in a moment, I had this person on my channel to talk his substack post, and discuss whether or not the clip under discussion was reasonable. I believe I made a solid case that it wasn’t. But I guess acting like that didn’t happen is more profitable, and gets more people subscribing to his substack.

His first criticism then begins by quoting SEKIII in saying, “Hold on the virtue of consistency. The refusal to compromise . . . created agorism.” Nice chopjob. He does what so many people who try to criticize agorism do, and he refuses to include the actual context of the thing he cites. That is a quote from “An Agorist Primer” where Konkin continues:

“One way of thinking came close to agorism and is fairly well-known today; we will deal with Libertarianism later in some detail. An ideology of Liberty, it had to choose at one point between consistency with reality and being the “politics of liberty.” It chose the latter: the contradiction of seeking political power over others to eliminate political power over others. Those who continued to seek liberty consistently and without the practical contradiction of Libertarians became agorists. This is a second, historical definition for you.”

Konkin was well known for literally the exact opposite thing this man is quoting him for. It’s preposterous! Literally a key plank in the founding book of Agorism is anti-politics. I’ll get into that later, but the fact that he quoted something from the same section as the refutation of his core point is dizzyingly inconsistent and extremely intellectually dishonest. If you think Brandon is wrong because he’s telling people not to get involved in politics in the name of libertarianism, then you can’t quote any agorist thinkers, because all of us oppose using politics for this purpose. And specifically, we have a great article on this site that goes into some detail about this Nazi analogy, and that’s the reason he’s using this analogy, hoping that somebody asks him about this, so he can send this article. It’s good. I recommend everybody read it. Including LB. Instead of countering this though, LB just passes it off as following Godwin’s law, and claims that the strength of Brandon’s argument is what needs work. I would advise him to get an argument to begin with, if he means to criticize somebody’s argumentative strength, and LB didn’t even have one. Just dogma – that he failed to even properly contextualize. This guy could use taking his own advice on being more consistent.

But that’s just it. One literally can’t be consistent in this philosophy, and also participate in the political process. The whole point of this philosophy is that it avoids and circumvents the entire political process and frees people now. In fact, the person who made it, with whom LB claims to be familiar, can be quoted as saying exactly the opposite of what he’s saying in this piece. He said:

“The State’s Higher Circles were not about to yield their plunder and restore property to their victims at the first sign of opposition. The first counter- attack came from anti-principles already planted by the corrupt Intellectual Caste: Defeatism, Retreatism, Minarchy, Collaborationism, Gradualism, Monocentrism and Reformism – including accepting State office to “improve” Statism! All of these anti-principles (deviations, heresies, self-destructive contradictory tenets, etc.) will be dealt with later. Worst of all is Partyarchy, the anti-concept of pursuing libertarian ends through statist means, especially political parties. A “Libertarian” Party was the second counter-attack of the State unleashed on the fledgling Libertarians, first as a ludicrous oxymoron, then as an invading army. The third counter-attack was an attempt by one of the ten richest capitalists in the United States to buy the major Libertarian institutions – not just the Party – and run the movement as other plutocrats run all the other political parties in capitalist

states. The degree of success those statist counter-attacks had in corrupting libertarianism

led to a splintering of the Movement’s “Left” and the despairing paralyzation of

others.”

He blindly accuses Brandon of being subject to dogma, but he never defines how Brandon is being dogmatic. He also accuses Brandon of failing to have a model consistent with reality, and never actually determines the line at which his content stops being realistic. Simply asserting that something is unrealistic without describing why is what’s actually dogmatic. Not what Brandon wrote.

And he again tries to claim that Konkin is on his side, by quoting that same introductory section to exactly one thing Konkin wrote. Telling Brandon to check for consistency errors is great. Everyone should do that. But he doesn’t actually point out any consistency errors that might exist. Meanwhile, he’s incredibly inconsistent. And dare I say dogmatically wedded to the idea that statism can be adequate recourse for libertarian victory, without actually proving that’s consistent with reality. Konkin literally agreed with Brandon, and disagreed with LB, but yeah, be sure to claim knowledge of Konkin, only to quote one document which refutes you not long later, and ignore the rest of his work – what was your newsletter called again? “Been Awake™”? Coulda fooled me.

I disagree with many libertarians in their assessment of Spacex and Elon Musk, and I’m writing a piece right now on all of the failings of Elon Musk in a libertarian context, so just to be clear, we don’t have to be a hive mind here, and there is no dogma. But you’re specifically wrong about your criticism here, and you again fail to recognize the voice of Konkin when it’s speaking to you. A primary function of a significant amount of Konkin’s writing was to decry the state, and political parties which allow it to continue existing, and continue the bread and circuses that is the political process. He literally made a word for it.

Partyarchy.

Instead of the people ruling themselves, they are ruled by the state, begging once in a while for different members of the state in hopes that they will be slightly less oppressive, or possibly even more, depending on the political issue-du-jour. Konkin concluded that a consistent libertarian would be virulently against the state, and regularly speak out against it, and try to do everything possible to not associate with it, and not fund it, or follow its orders. The state, to him, was not something to be pragmatic about, but an evil, and not a necessary one either, much less with “representatives” from alleged “libertarian” circles.

He then summarily dismisses an entire section by claiming that, “The Presidency isn’t the only office in the land, libertarians who believe in decentralization should remember that.” What? On what planet are local politicians still beholden to grants and loans from the federal government somehow an example of a decentralized model? And how are they decentralized if they’re still central control mechanisms in their local area? It’s a hilarious leap to conclusions that because something is smaller and further away from the capital, it’s somehow decentralized. It’s specifically not. There’s nothing decentralized about having the entire country beholden by these tiny hooks to the massive kraken that is the machine of oppression. But don’t let that stop you from making this statement. Not very “Awake™” of him, but I guess that’s not something he had in mind.

After this, he dismisses an entire section discussing Ron Paul’s presidency bid by claiming that it’s nothing more than dogmatism to assert that the presidential elections in any way bear similarity to local politics. Of course, again, this person claims that local politicians are somehow decentralized, and I cannot wrap my head around how vapid that take seems to me. If all he has to do is repeat himself though, I guess I can do that too, and say that there is no decentralization in local politics. It’s just part of the machine, and the fact that it’s smaller, and closer to you, doesn’t change that. It just means that you’re less likely to rebel because it seems smaller, and because these people are your neighbors and you have to see them every day. But make no mistake, these people still send cops after people, and those cops do not have to serve or protect you. Every law is a lifted gun, and every politician is acting at the behest of centralized power. Anybody claiming otherwise is not a consistent libertarian.

His final point of “criticism” (if you can call it that, which you shouldn’t), is some vague appeal that can only be categorized as fallacious. He uses multiple large words to appear intelligent, but doesn’t describe how what he is saying is better from an evolutionary or ontological perspective, nor does he describe how supporting the state will somehow stunt the growth of bad technological applications during this period of heightened technological advancement. And simply saying we are born into a system, without describing why his approach to this system is superior is nothing more than an appeal to authority, or common practice, or again, one of many fallacies. Let’s be real here – this entire paragraph doesn’t mean anything. It might be the basis for the research into a thesis, but it’s not even a point on its own. I Kant even.

He finishes off with a conclusion exactly as intellectually consistent as the rest of the piece. He claims the strictures of dogma need to be “questions” (because he misspelled “questioned”), and claimed that the last year “has show” (because he misspelled “shown”) that libertarians need to protect flanks. His conclusion is that libertarians should do this by having somebody on the inside who has their backs. Well great. Now all we need is a time machine to prove that those people won’t betray us, or never had the intention of being at our six to begin with.

Oh wait. That doesn’t match reality. Not very consistent is it? Instead of trusting people with the power of the political machine, why don’t we put our money into people that we know in meatspace, so that if something happens, we know who to talk to? So that we’ll have actual decentralized structures who are beholden to market demands, and don’t have the state monopoly of violence to back them up should they stray from the path? Almost like dogma has replaced his consistency, and the only way for people to protect their flanks in his eyes is to trust the very people who attack those flanks to begin with, and ignore the core of the conflict in question.

So how can somebody read Konkin (or any other agorist) and then come to the conclusion that people who ascribe to this philosophy can do what he suggested? My answer is that they can’t. Either they forgot what he said, or they never read it to begin with. Both of which make them wholly inadequate for the discussion at hand, but that doesn’t stop a lot of people.

Then again, this problem isn’t isolated to this particular issue. It runs deeper than that, and speaks to a broader issue within many liberty circles. That issue is that people will speak on a subject and because people like what they say normally, or because they suit some bias, listeners gloss over the fact that they’re pretty much exactly wrong about what they’re saying. Why does that have anything to do with this?

The first time I interacted with this person, it was because I had the audacity to criticize somebody he liked. I went against somebody who identified as “Kingpilled”, and he didn’t like my assessment of the situation. Basically, the person in question tries to use the Bible to convince people of his specific version of Liberty, which involves basically ignoring the Bible, while claiming the Bible backs up what he’s saying. I cited many verses as an explanation for why this person was wrong, and LB told me I wasn’t fully understanding things, and that maybe a conversation could clear things up. I thought that would be interesting, so we scheduled an appearance on my YouTube channel.

In that appearance, basically, I repeated what I had said elsewhere, and didn’t hold anything back. I relied on Bible verses to prove that Matt Erickson was wrong about the Bible, and wrong about libertarianism at the same time, and I basically proved my case, occasionally with zingers. One of them was aimed at proving his personal inconsistency, because he thought the messaging he used in a substack letter about this situation was totally in line with the spirit of the Bible, but I thought it didn’t express much grace or love or anything like that, because all he was doing is telling poor people to stop being poor, and using a picture of Paris Hilton.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but Paris Hilton isn’t the image of Christianity. Jesus said “Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God.” (Luke 6:20) Somehow I feel like Paris and Jesus ain’t on the same width of path.

So why am I bringing this up? Well, if you want to talk down to the consistency of the founder of this site, perhaps he should work on his own consistency first. Perhaps he should be a better example of Christianity if he wants to discuss it as a topic. It’s rather amusing to me, rhetorically speaking, that the image he used in describing this situation claims that somehow rock is “weak” and eventually destroyed by water, which is “consistent.” One could use that same analogy to indict the Bible, because God himself is regularly referenced as The Rock, and The Water. And water is constantly evaporated and moved by the air, so what at first appears consistent is rather ephemeral and shifting upon closer examination. Especially since erosion means water is at least partly rock. Humans don’t need minerals to live or anything though, so rest assured that rockless water is the best water. It’s almost as though there’s a way to be both. And you don’t have to choose between his false dichotomy choices.

But that would involve consistency, and rhetorical thoroughness, and neither of those are in rich supply in many of the Liberty™ circles. This is why he could consistently insult somebody for doing what their philosophy says to do, consistently, while claiming to be the arbiter of consistency. Because ultimately, consistency is nothing more than a buzzword to some people, and it’s totally okay to be inconsistent as long as you’re in the right clique, and doing it for the clique itself. Then you’ll get retweets and congratulations, regardless of whether your content was reasonable or not, merely because you appealed to somebody’s bias. And that’s what really matters here, not liberty, right?

I mean, I disagree. But I’m not the one trying to cherry pick somebody’s ideas to claim that somebody else got them wrong. It’s totally fine in an agorist context to avoid politics. In fact, it is arguably the primary reason the philosophy exists to begin with, because the founder was frustrated with the way Murray Rothbard was going. He was frustrated with the libertarian party, and he was frustrated with the right wingers within it who seemed to want to cede ground to conservatives immediately. He directly discussed how voting does nothing but encourage a rigged system, and put money where it’s less useful.

We here at this site know this, and you’ll consistently see those points from us. That’s consistency. It seems what this person really wants is the ability to control what other people do, and then maintain that consistent control. Otherwise, why is he getting involved in politics, when he could just leave people to their own devices? It doesn’t seem very consistent to me. Not from a libertarian perspective, and certainly not the perspective of a Christian, who was supposed to not be of this world; who is supposed to avoid walking in the darkness, even for a second, avoid stealing, avoid lying, all of these necessary for the position of a politician. The reason Revelations happens in the Bible is because of people sacrificing ground to the powers that should not be. Those bought by the wicked one. The Bible’s solution is non-compliance, even if it puts you in jail or worse. But you wouldn’t hear that from quite a few people who call themselves Christians, and that’s because a lot of these people are bought by those powers, and are willing to make concessions in their own personal life, to make religion a governmental structure, and not a personal choice.

I’m not saying that applies to this person, but his ideas would be right at home in that mentality. So I cautioned him to be consistent, and not cede his Christianity (or his liberty) to political action, much less threaten other people by doing either. The true path to both is through living in accordance with ethics, and never sacrificing any, not even if it could lower your taxes for now, or something. And agorism has the answer to that too – just say no, and back it with your actions. Because ultimately, there are even ways to get around it that don’t require the violation of any ethical principles.

But you know, that’s just consistency talking – I hear some people don’t like that.

Maybe a better principle to apply here would be to state that anybody who uses the word epistemology in any context which is not an epistemological discussion, and does not include any epistemological assertions or questions within it, should not use the word epistemology, or attempt to call anyone out for alleged flaws in their approach. I find that people who use the word epistemology typically don’t actually know what they’re talking about. That typically extends to the rest of their point. This is no exception. I would love to see an actual rebuttal here, but somehow I doubt I’ll get one. Especially since I gave him exactly the amount of friendliness he gave us, just like I did in my show, and he didn’t like it too much then either. Called myself and a commenter in the chat an asshole for pointing out that if he is in debt, he’s still in negative wealth, meaning he himself has not stopped being poor.

Well, he’s not wrong – at least about me being an asshole. But I’m not wrong about what I said here, so I’ll take that characterization to the bank, no takesey-backsies. And since he admitted that using such provocative speech (the Paris Hilton shirt) was designed to provoke people, no matter how harsh and unnuanced it is, I don’t mind that this post will likely provoke him. We’ll see how consistent he is, in how he chooses to respond to this, when it’s out there.

Meanwhile, my advice, in the same way that Konkin might say it, is do not join, but rather smash, the state. The only consistent path to libertarianism is not sacrificing libertarian values in your own position. Ironically, being a Christian also precludes this, because you are not to steal, or live by the sword, or walk in darkness and light, or serve both God and mammon. There is so much in the bible, and I’m writing an article about some of it that can help in the agorist (and the rest) of anarchists’ struggles. It’s a rich document, and I advise people read it before they claim to know it, and apply this same principle consistently to everything.

I hope he actually reads An Agorist Primer and the New Libertarian Manifesto – I think the fact that he so clearly hasn’t is holding him back from a lifestyle he would probably agree with, and probably benefit a lot more from, and I hope to see him on board at some point. But as to this sort of post, there’s a lot wrong, and it speaks to much broader problems in liberty circles, which is the only reason I wrote this longass thing – as a way to describe what not to do. I hope he takes this criticism well, and uses it to make better posts in the future…even if they’re criticizing us. Because at least then, there won’t be enough wrong that there’s not even anything interesting to respond to.

I’m waiting.