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A Collection of Thoughts

Recently by Christian Light: An Airman’s Story of Changing From a Neocon to Libertarian Anarchist

As a libertarian I hate the word we. We may all be Libertarians here. Whether you are of the anarchist variety or minarchist we have one thing in common, we hate the state. As a libertarian anarchist I hate the state, I might hate it more than most anarcho-capitalists do. I hate everything it stands for. Hate is a strong word, but it describes what I feel. Why shouldn’t we use the word hate to describe how we feel toward this entity we call the state? I think we should use the word hate. After all, we are describing an institution that claims to have absolute control over us! That claims it owns us, it owns our actions. The very thought of this disgusts me. I hate the very thought of the state, the very thought of the state. I am a sovereign human being! How dare someone else tell me how I should live or what I should do with my life! I am a free human being. No government has to tell me I’m free. I know that I was born free. I don’t’ have to explain myself to anyone or any government.

The only thing we learn from history is that we never learn from history. We’ve been studying the Old Testament in my Philosophy class. What have I learned? (It was a question on one of my tests I just took) What I put was this. "I have learned that even since biblical time’s human nature has not changed. Technology has changed; it has changed our standard of living fundamentally. However human nature remains the same. We still do things that affect our fellow man. That hurt us all, our family, and our friends. This is sad…will we ever learn? Maybe not. No, we probably never will. We will continue to live our lives, Ignorant of feelings for others." We are a race that keeps repeating errors of our past. This is a very bleak observation of human nature, but this is human nature. This is what makes us human. I’m not a pessimist or an optimist really. I’m a realist. I look at things objectively and state what I see. Not what I want to see. This is what I see in human nature. When I tell people about how I believe the only moral society is one where all actions between people are voluntary, they say that this is some kind of utopia. I don’t believe in utopia, and I don’t think any other person who believes in a voluntary society believes it will be utopia. I tell these people that I don’t believe in utopia. I believe this is the most moral society and that this is the best way for society to be run. It won’t be perfect. No society is. There will still be murders, rapes, other crimes. However, I think that the commitance of these crimes will be greatly reduced in a voluntary society. Remember that true freedom does not mean security. This is the essence of freedom.

As of late I have been very disturbed about something. Christians and the Christian right in particular. It bothers me greatly how hawkish these people are. How they worship the state and call for more and more wars and killing. It’s sickening to me how they pervert the word of God. The Bible tells us to have no other Gods before God. But the Christian right has a God in something else. The state, and in particular the military of the state. They absolutely love the military. They can’t get enough of it. They love everything about it, the uniform, the killing, the wars, and the way of life it instills. I just don’t understand what happened. Why these individuals somehow think that the wars are moral and most even have the audacity to say that we are doing God’s work. That’s funny, isn’t Jesus called the prince of peace? Didn’t he teach us to love our enemies, to love our neighbors, to be compassionate towards others, to help others? What happened to these values? In the mind of these people War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.

In April I was still awaiting word on my discharge. Well, it finally went through. The military decided I shouldn’t remain within their ranks. I’m glad I am finally out. I’m fortunate that I was discharged. I would like to thank my commander personally. Without him I do not think I would be out of the military right now. He was the one that decided to let the discharge go through. I received an honorable discharge. July 3^rd was the day. The day I separated from the immoral institution known as the United States Military. The so called U.S. Air Force. A force that destroys with its drone attacks. The bravery of being out of range my friends, the so called bravery. So brave they don’t even have to leave their country to kill some of their own human beings. They only have to drive 20 minutes from home to do it. To control a joystick 20 minutes from home, to kill a terrorist. What a great feeling. They must be proud of what they do. The Bravery of being out of range, as we kill from thousands of miles away. Thank God our brave soldiers, marines, airman, and sailors are sacrificing their lives to protect our freedoms!!!!! What a joke. Protect our freedoms. More like protect our tyranny. I used to be proud of what I did, joining the military and such. Now I hate it. It’s a constant reminder of a terrible decision I made early in my life. A decision that caused me to serve tyranny and empire. I didn’t defend freedom and liberty. It’s all a lie. I have to live with that every day. I have to live with the fact that I made a decision to serve tyranny and not freedom. Sure, I was brainwashed into believing the American way was the right way, but this is a very different country than the one that was founded. That still doesn’t mean I can forgive myself. These are things that I have to look back upon for the rest of my life and contemplate. To contemplate and make sure I made the right decision. I’m completely sure I made the right decision to get out of the military early. Every day I was afraid that they were going to start a new war somewhere. That I was going to be forced to be part of something I thought was morally wrong. I was most afraid of being thrown in jail. I told my chain of command that I would not participate in the next war they start. I didn’t even care if it was declared by congress or not. There was no way in good moral conscience that I could participate in another immoral war. I thank God that it never came to that. I guess after the election we will see how serious Obama or Romney really are about Iran. I’m just glad that I won’t be still in the military when they make that decision.

It’s been 2 ½ months since I separated. I’m back in Texas living with one of buddies here. Now I’m working full time delivering pizza at dominos and going to school full time (thanks to my GI Bill). I did struggle for a bit deciding on whether I should use government services or not (like my GI Bill, Pell Grant, other benefits the state hands out) I read what Walter Block had to say about it and changed my mind. Why shouldn’t we use these services, after all it’s our money! The government stole that money from me in taxes to pay for these services. So now I don’t feel guilty at all getting money from the government. I just see it as getting money back that was stolen from me. My goal is to finish up my associates and transfer to Loyola University in New Orleans where Walter Block currently works. I want to get a doctorate in economics and be an economics professor one day. I think this is one of the best ways for me to contribute to the freedom movement. The Austro-libertarian philosophy is such a huge influence on my life and I think I should do something in that field. At the end of October I am going to attend the Supporters Summit in Callaway Gardens. I’m very much looking forward to this. It will be exciting to see and meet all the people I listen to and learn from in real life. It’s been hard adjusting from military to civilian life again. I’m happy that I am out, but I still have much to reflect on. I have much to learn, but I am young and my journey is just beginning.

September 29, 2012

Christian Light [send him mail] is a former Air Force Security Forces Airman. After joining the military he became disillusioned and became a Ron Paul minarchist, eventually gravitating and becoming a Rothbardian Anarcho-capitalist. He currently lives in Texas and is aspiring to be an economics professor.

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