The State, Destruction, and Propaganda

[From my Webnote series]

I’ve often commented that the state is good at nothing except destruction–stealing, killing, breaking things. But it occurs to me that this may be wrong: that the state may also be good at one other thing. The reason it’s good at destruction–far better than a private criminal, say–is because it is institutionalized (see Rummel; Liberals on Rehnquist: Hypocrite Criminals in our Midst; Spooner’s comments about the highwayman in No Treason No. VI: The Constitution of No Authority, Section III). It is seen as legitimate, and thus is able to get away with far more, on a far more systematic and continuing basis, than mere private criminals. Why is this? Because it is able to deceive the people into believing it is legitimate. I.e., the state is also very good at propaganda. I am not sure why this is so, since the state is bad at everything else (except destruction). Perhaps it is simply the case that if and to the extent criminal gangs are able to persuade people that they have legitimacy, they become states and become able to commit institutionalized crime. In any event, thank goodness the state is not even better at propaganda!

As Mark Thornton notes,

Without efficiency or morality to back it, socialism is then revealed as merely a parasitic state using the carrot of political favors and the stick of violence to live off its host. Ultimately, the state uses propaganda of many forms to sustain an ideology that prevents the host from relieving itself of the parasite, and in class we had a wide-ranging discussion as to propaganda of the US government.

For more on the state’s use of ideological propaganda, see Hans-Hermann Hoppe, “Banking, Nation States and International Politics: A Sociological Reconstruction of the Present Economic Order,” Review of Austrian Economics 4 (1990): 62 et seq., reprinted in The Economics and Ethics of Private Property, pp. 86-87; idem, “The Economics and Sociology of Taxation,” in idem, The Economics and Ethics of Private Property, pp. 64–65; also my post Swinkels and Hoppe on the Tacit Support of the State.

This is why it’s important to mock and laugh at the state:

Earlier this year I was on a panel (discussed here) with Hoppe and DiLorenzo. In response to a question about the prospects for liberty, I noted the importance of economic literacy, in part to deflate the mistaken belief on the part of decent people that the state is necessary and legitimate. Without the tacit support of the state’s legitimacy, it could not exist. And this is why it is important to laugh at the state.  Hoppe agreed, saying he has actually considered featuring a libertarian comedian at an upcoming  event, and DiLorenzo explained that one reason he often mocks the state and its media cheerleaders is for this very purpose–he gave the example of ridiculing Rachel Maddow in a recent LRC post where he referred to her getting her “panties in a knot”. We need to show these people as buffoons and clowns and to make people take them less seriously. (See also the Mises Daily article Laughing at the Regime.)

Laugh at the State, Mock the Regime.

So: laugh at them, mock them, ridicule them, jeer them, scoff. Do not take them seriously.