Social Contracts and Sacred Rituals

"You consented, but I can't prove it."

The "Social Contract" non-argument for taxation and government is logically self-detonating. How does one acquire the right to form a social contract with other people without their consent? The magic of mob rule euphemistically known as "the democratic process"?

If individuals can delegate this right to others, it must be because they themselves have the right to form social contracts. If individuals do have the right to form social contracts then all individuals must have this right. If some individuals claim that other individuals are bound by social contract to submit to taxation, those other individuals could simply respond by saying that the first set of individuals are bound by social contract to submit to a taxation request tax. The first set of individuals could simply respond in turn by saying that the second set of individuals are bound by social contract to submit to a taxation request request tax for the original taxation request tax for the original taxation, and the cycle could repeat ad infinitum...

...assuming no one points guns at each other to get what they want, which isn't a safe assumption at all given that we're talking about statists.

So either EVERYONE has the right to create and enforce social contracts or NO ONE does.

If the truth isn't the latter, the "I want you thrown in jail for resisting but taxation is still voluntary because you agreed to a social contract by being here so leave if you don't like it" line of "reasoning" (if it can be called that) could also be used to justify "I might have a gun to your head but rape at gunpoint is consensual because you agreed to a social contract by being here so leave if you don't like it."

The implication is that everyone owns everyone, which is collective slavery. The individual is the most oppressed minority in all of human history. There is no such thing as a social contract; there are only people trying to mask their preference for slavery with euphemistic gaslighting and religious appeals to the legitimacy of physical aggression. I don't know about you, but I'm against all forms of slavery.

What types of slavery do you support?

Leave if you don't like it.

Given that there are taxes for expatriation and mandates for government issued passports, it can't legitimately be claimed that people are "free to leave" America if they dislike the outcome of an election or the fact that "the state" is just a superstitious delusion held by individuals who imagine they have the moral authority to initiate physical aggression against others for some fictitious "greater good".

Statists who attempt to make this claim start from the false presumptions that "the people" are "the state", that "the state" owns all individuals, and that the existence of an individual constitutes that individual's implied consent to be owned and ruled by others - especially if that individual participates in the ritual of symbolic consent called "voting".

It may be true that statists also claim non-voters have no right to complain but their erroneous appeal to the imaginary "social contract" is primarily derived not from non-participation but rather from the notion that those who participate in the political process are doing so with the implied understanding that all participants will accept and abide by the outcome even if it's not the one they each personally prefer.

So in other words, from the perspective of an individual statist, the participation of other people in the political process strengthens the delusion that elections give some individuals the moral authority to inflict physical aggression on others without provocation.

That's why political action only reinforces statism but never reduces it.

You can't reduce the power of a delusion by indulging the delusional.

About the Author

I'm Jared Howe! I'm a Voluntaryist hip hop artist and professional technical editor/writer with a passion for Austrian economics and universal ethics. You can catch my podcast every Friday on the Seeds of Liberty Podcast Network.