The Westboro Anarchists

Ultimately my experience with IHS this summer has more akin to a class with a really difficult professor. Not that the lectures weren’t relevant and informative, or the internship itself wasn’t educational, for they were. Instead, I’m referring to the clash of ideas with the other fellows that (for us state-based interns) occurred primarily during the opening and closing seminars. While a respectful debate between peers produces understanding, learning to deal with hostile conflict 

We all believed in limited government and free markets, but a vocal segment decided that that wasn’t enough. Instead of creating allies, we drew lines. The label “statist” was bandied about with extreme prejudice, even though none of us could remotely be considered fans of the government.

One understanding I have of Anarchy involves an entirely voluntaristic state populated by entrepreneurs who live together in peace and harmony because they have grown past the need for force and violence. It is, in a hippy-sense, loving. Yet I saw nothing loving from its more serious proponents.

I know it’s inappropriate to judge an entire movement based on a few individuals with egos like bloated, puss-filled welts, and thus I have dubbed these people “The Westboro Anarchists”. On some level it might be better to even take their sect status away and simply relegate them to the loony bin.

The oddest part was I received more hostility from the Westboro Anarchists then I have from people who hate capitalism. It was almost because I was ideologically close to them that fueled their raged. Were I a modern liberal who idealized Che Guevara, they might view me as a three-legged puppy: and object of pity with an intellect too small to comprehend their brilliant arguments. However, because I “compromise” by only working within the realm of political and cultural reality, I have been tainted and must be purged. Anything less then utopia is heretical. Burn the alien, the mutant, the statist.

It reminds me the story about how Mises refused to talk to Hayek for a decade because he suggested that public education might be a public good. Crime of the century.

There must be some reason inherent in the thought process of some radical idealogs that causes these barbaric mutations. Is it the feeling of being an elite in possession of the gnosis? Perhaps it’s a smug superiority that believes that the thoughts of others ought to bow before your sandal-clad feet? Whatever the reason, they better enjoy their own little world, because sycophants aside, they will gain no followers.

Yes, they were out of bounds. Yes, they were anything but respectful. But that’s how the real world works. Deformed foes who fill their bloated stomachs with the torn flesh of allies prowl the alleys of though, and it is good to be ready for them. At the very least, the revulsion will be less.

And let it be known that I do find the anarchist theories to be engaging and profitable for discussion. I know that it can be respectfully discussed and debated. Instead, I fight mostly against buffoons, regardless of ideology.