|
On Voting
Should it be illegal?
 Joe Palmersheim -- Guest Column
|
|
Being that this is an election year, a lot of people are going to be running about, telling us how we're no damned good because us young'uns aren't fulfilling our civic duty by voting. We're shirking.
Right. Like it is a bad thing that a whole bunch of us aren't all that hot on getting involved with the government.
The way I see it, complaining that we aren't voting is a lot like complaining that we aren't visiting enough whorehouses, or that we aren't kicking enough dogs.
George Washington, the first leader of this particular government, had this to say: “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like a fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master.”
I know what you’re thinking, George was a crazy old war vet, who grew (and probably smoked) a lot of weed. The guy didn't know what he was talking about! Government is not evil! Government is there to help us. It exists to provide us with cradle to grave nourishment, education, and warm, fuzzy feelings! It doesn't hurt us!
Think again. Think about how government interacts with us. About the only thing it does is to create and enforce laws, which are, by and large, statements that tell us what we can or cannot do.
Big deal, you think. Everyone tells me what I can or cannot do. How is this different?
The difference is this: Government is the only social institution which uses violence, or the threat thereof, to enforce its mandates.
Take, for example, the rather minor offense of underage drinking. If I told you that you can't drink, what would happen if you did so? Not a damn thing. If I went to a party with you and tried to make you pay me $200 for drinking, you'd laugh at me. But what if the government tells you the same? What if a cop catches you with a beer? You get a ticket, right? Doesn't seem very violent. Well, what if you don't pay that ticket? You get a summons. Still doesn't seem that violent. And if you don't attend court? You get a warrant for your arrest. And then, if a cop sees you? He tries to arrest you, which is to say, he tries to forcibly separate you from your natural right to freedom. And if you resist? He uses violent means to force compliance. The only reason this isn’t obvious is that most of you pay the ticket.
This is how all governments operate. All laws operate on the use, or threat, of violence. Otherwise they wouldn't be laws! They would be suggestions. Since government, in order to be just, must be based on the consent of the governed, and since, morally speaking, you can only consent for another to use violence in your stead when someone's person or property has been threatened or attacked, the only laws you can justly vote for are those that protect person or property.
Since most voting goes far beyond this, it is simply unjustly authorizing agents of government to use violent means to achieve social ends, and thus, the less voting that occurs, the better off society is.
|
|
|
|
|
|
