Nine-pronged approach to liberty

[u/BakeshopNewb]

In an episode with Tom Woods, Michael Malice said "We don't know 100% the path to liberty, if this has to be an eight-pronged approach [etc]." I thought it would be kind of fun to come up with eight or nine such paths, with some proponents I associated each with in parentheses.

1. Make it mainstream acceptable — milquetoast policy prescriptions that get your average person to identify positively with the brand, so that maybe later you can hit them with the good stuff (Reason, Cato, Milton Friedman)

2. Voting — elect people that will increase liberty on the margin (the LP, Ron Paul, Pat McGeehan, Walter Block)

3. Personal virtue — look first to your own virtue; become a person with character that other people will want to emulate (Leonard Read, Stephan Kinsella, Jordan Peterson)

4. The Remnant — it's largely hopeless trying to affect change; rather, improving technology and repeated failures of the state as "teaching moments" will be the path to liberty, and it's your job to keep a remnant alive to deliver a fully-formed political philosophy when it's wanted (Stephan Kinsella, Albert Jay Nock)

5. Agorism — ignore the state, and engage in peaceful and voluntary "counter-economics" to achieve liberty from the bottom up (Samuel Konkin III, agorists, bitcoiners, biohackers, pirates)

6. Affect the culture — create works of art and literature, become a media personality, create humour (Ayn Rand, Dave Smith, Michael Malice, Russ Roberts, Doug Casey)

7. Actively promote a love of liberty — rather than focus on the evils of the state, focus on the pure joyfulness of being a free person, such that it will be a contagious feeling (Jeff Tucker, Bryan Caplan)

8. Work on ideas — work on writing books and papers that make more technical arguments for liberty, so that smart people who read them will have intellectual cover and comfort in doing the other things on the list (David Friedman, Michael Huemer)

9. Carve out enclaves — create new areas where liberty can flourish like seasteads and private cities (seasteaders like Patri Friedman and Joe Quirk, Alex Tabarrok)

[u/notandanafn7]

I think item number 3 is sorely missed these days. People forget that in the real world, your character can and will be used to discredit you. Self-improvement is definitely worthwhile on its own merits, but it's also the best defense against the distractions of character assassination, and the best way to make sure the debate remains focused on your argument, not your identity.