I've recently started posting on Substack. (You can see my stuff here.) A lot of what I'm posting are articles and blog posts that I wrote many years ago, but that are still (sadly, in many cases) very relevant today.
This is one of them. I wrote it at Christmastime five years ago, and it is even more true in today's world.
Following my piece is my husband, reading the timeless "Rules of Christmas."
Enjoy. And Merry Christmas.
From the Freedom's Phoenix Online Newspaper.
"Paradise is exactly like where you are right now… only much, much, better."
Laurie Anderson
What if I told you that we're already living in Galt's Gulch?
What if I told you that we don't actually need to find a bunch of like-minded people and go in on a big piece of land together, far away from everyone else, and build our own societies from the ground up?
Not that there's anything wrong with that of course.
But it's not necessary. We already have the tools at our disposal - most of them anyway - to create and maintain free societies right where we are.
COMMON LAW:
Volumes have been written, some of them very very good, about how a stateless society might operate, how rights might be protected and crime dealt with in the absence of a monopoly on violence and the justice system.
But we already have a body of law that upholds the rights of individuals, protects their property, and defends contracts. It exists in stark contrast to the multitudes of laws created by politicians and their cronies – laws that often directly violate this older and more fundamental body of law. And it is enforceable.
Dale Brown, founder of the Detroit Threat Management Center, understands this. When he saw police failing to protect people from crime in one of the worst neighborhoods of Detroit, he moved in and started doing it himself. As he told Tom Woods, back in 2016:
"Any citizen can take someone into custody if they commit a violent act,” said Brown. “(I’ve learned better ways of crime prevention) because I have to. I'm accountable. I have no qualified immunity. That means, if I put my hands on someone it has to be legal. There has to be a way for me to explain it as a civilian. As a result, we've had no court date in 20 years. No lawsuits... in 20 years.”
Brown's methods rely on common-law principles. He and his Threat Management team only take action against those committing genuine crimes against people or their property. Because they are not agents of the state, they do not enforce laws against drug use or other victimless "crimes." And they employ the power of citizens' arrest, which is available to all of us.
Imagine how our world might look if there were Threat Management-like operations in every city. With the abject failure of police departments to protect people and property, their willingness to commit violent actsagainst those they are sworn to protect, and their inherent lack of any real accountability, private solutions like this have never been more necessary.
Others are using principles well established in contract law to hold accountable those in positions of power, using tools such as the Notice of Liability to stop city governments, school districts, and other entities from committing acts of trespass, for example; or
We do not need to establish a brand-new system of laws in order to begin protecting ourselves from political aggression.
PARALLEL INSTITUTIONS:
Likewise, we do not need to isolate ourselves in order to create parallel institutions and services to replace the crumbling state-dominated ones. Nor do we need to isolate ourselves geographically in order to build real, in-person communities based on a respect for individual liberty.
For many years, alternative-medicine practitioners and others have operated under private membership associations (PMAs), serving members only and not the general public. Their PMA status places these operations outside of the jurisdiction of much of the regulatory state, creating a space within which free-market activity can flourish.(For more information about PMAs, or to establish one yourself, see here and here. Here's ours.)
Meanwhile, creative ways are emerging to assist people in exiting broken systems, forging new ones, and connecting with others who wish to do the same.
Read the rest here.
Image: Public Domain.
Christmas has come a little early this year.
The editors of The BMJ have published an open letter to Mark Zuckerberg today, calling him to account for the abomination that is Facebook's "fact-checking" enterprise.
There's really nothing that needs to be added to their letter as it provides the full context for their complaint. And it is a thing of beauty. It's not long, and deserves a full read, but here are some highlights:
We find the “fact check” performed by Lead Stories to be inaccurate, incompetent and irresponsible.
-- It fails to provide any assertions of fact that The BMJ article got wrong
-- It has a nonsensical title: “Fact Check: The British Medical Journal Did NOT Reveal Disqualifying And Ignored Reports Of Flaws In Pfizer COVID-19 Vaccine Trials”
-- The first paragraph inaccurately labels The BMJ a “news blog”
-- It contains a screenshot of our article with a stamp over it stating “Flaws Reviewed,” despite the Lead Stories article not identifying anything false or untrue in The BMJ article
-- It published the story on its website under a URL that contains the phrase “hoax-alert”
We have contacted Lead Stories, but they refuse to change anything about their article or actions that have led to Facebook flagging our article.
We have also contacted Facebook directly, requesting immediate removal of the “fact checking” label and any link to the Lead Stories article, thereby allowing our readers to freely share the article on your platform.
Merry Christmas!!!
UPDATE: A seismologist has replied on my Twitter thread about this episode, and you can see her comments here. (As I mention in the episode, I had written to four different seismologists before speaking with Brent, asking for their take on what he has to say, but had not received a response from any of them.) I'm guessing there will be some back and forth here for a few days at least, and I'll post my thoughts after that has run its course.
--------
You may have seen "Canadian Earthquake Researcher" on Twitter, posting about the unusual tectonic "blocking" he is seeing, and what he thinks it means: A massive seismic disruption that will shake the entire world in a way humans have never seen before.
But he's just a guy on Twitter, right? He's not even a seismologist, right?
Right. But he also has a string of eerily accurate predications spanning the past couple of years.
Join me as I speak with Brent Dmitruk, AKA Canadian Earthquake Researcher. You can also find his videos on YouTube, here.
Brent's website is here, and you can see his list of predictions here.
The USGS earthquake monitoring site is here, EMSC is here, and Tertremo is here.
And here is the article about the Japanese research that Brent mentions.
"Dutchsinse", who he mentions in the interview, is on Twitter here.
Freogan Fellowship Learning's classes for teens start next week!
We're very excited, and we think you should be too. We are launching Freogan Fellowship Learning with classes that address two of the most critical issues facing our world today - especially for anyone who cares about ever again living in a free society:
"Propaganda and the Personal" explores the ways in which information has been manipulated throughout the ages for the purpose of manipulating human beings, and how to avoid falling victim to it...
...and "Our Common-Law Foundations" looks at both the philisophical and practical underpinnings of a society based in law that protects rights vs. law that protects rulers.
Our regular price for each of these classes is $320, or $640 for both.
But now, if you sign up for BOTH classes, we will drop the price from $640 to $499!
See the posts below for class descriptions, or contact FFL for more information, and to register for classes.
And yes... for now, these are for teens (and some pre-teens) only. Sorry adults! We may add some classes for you in the future.
Freogan Fellowship Learning is the education arm of Freogan Fellowship Ministry, a private membership association, serving members only.
I had an article up last week over at LewRockwell.com last week, about the work that needs doing, the urgency of doing it, and the very strong possibility that we just might win. Check it out.
As I leave my friend, the wind blows a lone cloth mask in front of me and it rolls across my path like a tumbleweed.
This wind. It’s tearing apart old alliances, old tribes, even long-held friendships. Even families.
But it’s also sweeping people into new groupings, pushing us together out of necessity, whereupon many of us realize: These are the people we should have had in our lives all along. These are the right alliances, better tribes. And it seems crazy that it’s taken this wild windstorm to bring us together.
By afternoon, the wind is in a real fury. Our giant inflatable pumpkin family has been blown across the yard and now sits huddled around our tiny weeping cherry tree. I go out and corral them back into place next to the giant inflatable Halloween tree, and for a while anyway, all seems as it should be.
I don’t mean to suggest that any of this is going to be easy, or that there’s nothing to be afraid of...
Read the rest here.
From my piece:
"The manipulation of the conversation around vaccines in the mainstream media has been nothing short of a tour de force. If you read only mainstream publications, you might come away with the impression that outbreaks of measles are the most serious public health crisis since the Black Death. You might think that those who do not vaccinate are uneducated, superstitious, “anti-science” zealots who get their information from daytime talk shows. You might even start to feel outrage at these people who – for no good reason at all – have decided to endanger everyone else by refusing to do what every doctor knows is perfectly safe, effective and the socially responsible thing to do.
"The presentation of this issue has been a study in just how easy it can be to generate mass hysteria around a particular threat – even while much more serious threats inspire no such response. It’s as if every mainstream reporter has been given the same playbook to use in putting together their articles about vaccines – a playbook designed to elicit the above response from the public. I’ve tried to imagine what this playbook must look like and I think I’ve come up with a pretty decent facsimile. Here it is, along with my own annotations:
"1. Make it clear that parents who choose not to vaccinate their children are only getting their information from Jenny McCarthy, Jim Carey and other celebrities with absolutely no scientific credentials.
"Pretend that doctors and scientists who are critical of vaccines – doctors like Dr. Suzanne Humphries, , Dr. Kenneth Stoller, Dr. Robert Rowen, Dr. Janet Levatin, Dr. Stephanie Cave, Dr. Sherri Tenpenny, Dr. Meryl Nass, Dr. Jay Gordon, Dr. Jane Orient, and many of the members of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, CDC researcher Dr. William Thompson, and all of the doctors and scientists listed here and here – don’t exist. Because really, if you don’t write about them, they don’t."
Read the whole thing here.
I was on "Declare Your Independence with Ernest Hancock" last week, talking about my new venture: The Freogan Fellowship Ministry. (It's the first interview here, although you might want to stay on for the second one with Dave Ridley, about the New Hampshire secession bill!)
We talk about the mission of Freogan Fellowship (rebuilding the foundations of civilization for free men and women), the origins of the word "Freogan", and our first project: Freogan Fellowship Learning, and the classes for teens that we'll be offering later this month:
"Propaganda and the Personal" - This course will explore propaganda, politics, and the personal, with a focus on the 20th Century up to the present moment. We will examine some of the key players, the ideologies, and the techniques that have led us to the current crisis, as well as what our part in it has been and could be.
"Our Common-Law Foundations" - This course will utilize the Socratic method to explore the roots of the modern western legal system. We will be using outside sources, and students should expect lots of real-time conversation. There will be some reading to be done outside of class, as well as some thinking.
Beginning in the spring, we will also offer courses in literature, history, and economics.
Parents can get more details, and sign up for classes here.
...sign up before October 10th to get the Early Bird rate!
"Propaganda and the Personal" is one of the first two classes that our new PMA education venture (Freogan Fellowship Learning) we will be offering, beginning the week of October 25th. You can get more information, or sign up now by emailing us.
This course will explore propaganda, politics, and the personal, with a focus on the 20th Century up to the present moment. We will examine some of the key players, the ideologies, and the techniques that have led us to the current crisis, as well as what our part in it has been and could be.
We will compassionately interrogate our own biases and assumptions so that we are not doomed to repeat, and we will find ways forward – to begin building a future that we truly want for ourselves and our communities.
Each class runs for eight weeks, with two live class sessions per week.
For those who sign up before October 1, the cost is $240 plus a small materials fee.
Starting on October 1, the class fee will be $320.
Note that Freogan Fellowship Learning is part of a private membership association, and serves only members of the association. This means that anyone taking our courses must first become a member. Membership is free, and can be cancelled at any time.
This conference is not for everyone.
My friend Dr. Edith Ubuntu Chan has brought together some of the most powerful voices in homeschooling and unschooling, for a three-day conference dedicated to breaking old education paradigms and building new ones.
This fall, many families are RISING UP and choosing to raise their children in ways that are far more respectful, and honoring of the individual child, than most of what we know as "education" has been.
If you are among them, consider signing up, here.
(Note: This is an affiliate link, and I will get a little something for everyone who signs up from it.)