From: "Dr. Rich Artym" <rartym@galacta.demon.co.uk>
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 1996 01:08:19 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Reasons in support of crypto-anarchy
Message-ID: <199602101157.LAA00451@galacta.demon.co.uk>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


In message <199602070213.UAA03036@einstein.ssz.com>, Jim Choate writes:

> If the intent is to motivate others to kill or otherwise harm others simply
> because you don't agree with them or their actions is reprehensible and
> moraly or ethicaly undefensible.

I agree, but not for your reasons.  "Reprehensible" and "ethically
undefensible" both presupose that *you* can make an objective moral
judgement that you are right and others are wrong, which is no better
than the moral judgement that the politicians are making.  A better
reason for agreeing with your position is simply that value judgements
of any kind are subjective, and therefore they cannot apply to everyone
and hence it is a clear coercion to try to apply them to everyone.
Coercion of one man's subjective views onto another is the fundamental
fault in the position of the censors;  it's a very fundamental attack on
perhaps the most basic freedom we have, regardless of whether there is
a Constitution or Ammendments in the country in which we live.

> > 2.  How can we keep the government from banning encryption, digital
> > cash, and other systems that will improve our freedom?
> > 
>
> By making shure they don't have the authority to make the decision in the
> first place.

It might well be too late for that:  they've already taken the authority.
Now we're starting a process of taking it back, and we can do so without
bloodshed by moving the source of their power (monetary transactions and
the consequent taxation) beyond their reach.  That's where crypto comes in,
and that's why many of us are here.

> Every citizen of this country is a 'government employee' in one sense or
> another.

It is important that we adopt this overtly innocent view of civil servants
and governments as our *servants*, because it is on the grounds of service
that they justify their positions and actions on the single day every few
years that we get to vote them in.  Shoving the term "servant" down their
throats at every opportunity is an excellent attack on their positions of
power over us.

Rich.
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