The Future of Free Education

One way or another we have all enjoyed education. And that word, enjoy, is precisely the issue facing the state of education today. Because when you look back at your schooling experience, from the first day away from your parents to the day your graduation released you, can you truly say you enjoyed it? Can you honestly say that you spent those years thriving, learning and taking full advantage of your childhood? If you do, congratulations, consider yourself lucky. But I think I speak for many when I say that so many hours in the meatgrinder that is the school system where either wasted on frivolous things or even worse: hours spent crushing your spirit and leaving a bad test in your mouth when you think about learning.

I for one do not believe that this is a mere coincidence or purely a matter of which particular school you went to. I think crushing the free, curious spirit of children has been a feature and not a bug since the beginning, even though many teachers may not have that intent. Over the course of the following posts, I would like to go on a journey with you to explore the origins of the modern public schooling paradigm, the problems arising from it, and the possible alternatives.

I won’t do this purely from scratch, without standing on the shoulder of the giants who thought and wrote about this challenge before me. One major inspiration is John Taylor Gatto, who through Dumbing us Down and The Underground History of American Education has shined a critical light on the state of modern education. Another inspiration is the work Corey DeAngelis has been doing with Reason, FEE, multiple podcasts, and on Twitter. He strikes me as not only a thoroughly passionate defender of educational freedom but also an exceptionally well-informed one. Together I hope we can find a way forward when it comes to giving the youth of today and tomorrow the opportunities they deserve.

Liberty and survivalism: what’s their relationship?

The relationship between these movements has been on my mind in the last few months, in particular, the strongest similarities that they have.

One first similarity is the fact that most survivalists/preppers have a high level of distrust in the government, just like libertarians. Often that doesn’t quite reach the level of institutional rejection, but it’s still worth something. What I mean by that is that some survivalists say they would resist government tyranny and oppression no matter how legal it is, but then they go on a full-on Back the Blue, Support the Troops rant. Those are exactly the people who would take your guns push come to shove. Think about the latest 4th of July parade, where many on the ‘MAGA’ right celebrated tanks rolling down the street on a holiday that is dedicated to rebellion against a powerful government with a standing army. Seems like some reflection is in order

Nevertheless, the rhetoric is still promising. A good comparison here would be with the rhetoric of Reagan and his Moral Majority conservatives, no to mention their intellectual heirs: the nice words are present, but the consistent practice is not.  Another example of this is Ben Shapiro, one of the most prominent conservative commentators in the digital space: he regularly and consistently talks about how the 2nd amendment was enacted in order to enable resistance against government tyranny but here’s the kicker: in the same episode he talks about how cops and soldier deserve a great deal of trust and deference and how they are “just doing their jobs”.

Conservatives like this may not be able to see the inconsistency present but that does not change that fact that it’s there. I am isolating conservatives here because they have a lot of representation in the survivalist movement.

In any case, the consideration of survivalism as a movement, libertarianism as a movement and their connection has several other interesting implications.

The second attribute is this; although individual self-reliance is a vital characteristic to have, it is also crucial to be able to play well with others. After all, because of comparative advantage and economies of scale, one’s chances of survival are far higher in a group. This necessarily implies a level of leadership skills that are necessary in order to effectively run a survival group. Whether you wish to use real-life survival scenarios or post-apocalyptic fiction as your benchmark, this is undeniable. A recent fictional example that comes to mind is the Van Helsing show I have been watching in the past few weeks. While it is true that this is a supernatural show with vampires and what have you, there are some basic, fundamental truths about human nature and the nature of human needs that are so universal that any good piece of fiction can reflect these truths. This includes the value of teamwork. Of course, there are many other works of fiction which play into this dynamic, such as The 100, Jericho and others. In all of these shows, the survival of the group hinges on teamwork, as in real life.

A final basic truth which may seem self-evident but is important to consider is the necessity of self-defense. This requires not only the presence of adequate supplies and equipment(the easy part) but also the far more fundamental: tactics, skills and mindset(credit to tire iron’s corner blog). Mindset comes first of course. It is a kind of life philosophy on the one hand and character on the other. As far as a life philosophy is concerned I think Stoicism is a strong basis for living in a high stress, low certainty situations like extreme survival.  Character is a trickier part of the equation, but certainly no less important. In fact, it is likely the most important thing you can rely on if push comes to shove.

Now, this is only the beginning of my exploration of this issue. But it wouldn’t be complete without sharing two resources I have found particularly instructive while pondering it:

  1. The Survival Podcast by Jack Spirko. He has published multiple episodes and mini-essays on how his libertarian and his survivalist philosophy weave together and has covered the topic of leadership as well. His six survival tenets, in particular, provide a web of interlocking premises that, in my opinion, work together quite well.

2. The gentlemen over at ZeroGov. They have a very different type of internet presence but have also been prominent in bringing the topic of this post to greater prominence, especially on Twitter. I look forward to exploring their perspectives further in the future.

Episode 5: LU Hangout-Article 13, Assange, Candles in the Dark

For this episode, I am joined by Daniel and Robert from the Actual Anarchy podcast for the latest episode of the Libertarian Union Talkshow! We talk about the new Article 13 copyright rules of the EU, Assange’s prospects after his expulsion from the Ecuadorian embassy and Larken Rose’s Candles in the dark. I hope you’ll enjoy it, and don’t hesitate to get in touch for questions, suggestions or comments!

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Extreme Ownership review 1/3 is out!

It took a while to release this episode because of technical issues, but now it’s out: the review of Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink, part 1! Because I have described the content in the last post, I won’t rehash that.

The web player:

The direct download link:

http://traffic.libsyn.com/gaiuslib/GL-Tony_Rockamora-ep_004.mp3

I hope you like it, and if you have any questions, comments or suggestions, don’t hesitate to get in touch!

After technical issues, extreme ownership review pt. 1

Under normal conditions, I would have released a new podcast episode right now. Unfortunately, I seem to be having some major technical issues with the laptop I use to edit my raw audio. It appears that the audio jack has somehow been damaged to such an extent that it no longer recognizes the headset as an audio output. This makes it difficult, if not impossible to pay attention to the finer details that need to be tinkered with in order to produce an adequate audio file. Because of that I am postponing this release by at least one week.

The topic is a review of the book Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin, and it was recorded as a discussion with Tony Rockamora of the Don’t Waste Your Hate podcast. In the first episode, we discuss Part I: Winning the War Within. I think we had a very interesting discussion that you’ll definitely like if you are interested in the topic of leadership. So by all means, stay tuned for the upcoming release, and if you want to get in touch you can find me on social media, leave a comment or send me an e-mail at gaiuslibertatis@gmail.com!

Episode 2: Law Laid out, part 1

I use one of my first text books of my Bachelor of Law to discuss some fundamental concepts in law. This is only the first chapter of that book, so I can and probably will go into a lot more detail on this. I hope you enjoy it!

[podcast src=”https://html5-player.libsyn.com/embed/episode/id/8678558/height/360/theme/standard/thumbnail/yes/direction/forward/” height=”” width=”100%” placement=”bottom” theme=””]

Ep. 1 an interview with Patrick McFarlane

My first regular episode, my interview with Patrick McFarlane of the Liberty Weekly podcast. We talk about his background in starting the podcast, his legal-themed episodes, the Libertarian Union and more. It has been quite some time since this episode was recorded, so some of the information is now out of date. He is no longer in law school for instance. Much of the information is more timeless though, and an updated interview is up for consideration!

The embedded player

Direct download

http://traffic.libsyn.com/gaiuslib/Gaius_Libertatis_001_-_Patrick_MacFarlane.mp3

Hello world!

Very soon I will be uploading the first episodes of this podcast/blog project. Stay tuned for more! You can get in touch through the comment section or by mailing to gaiuslibertatis@gmail.com. I will also be maintaining several social media platforms, which shall be shared as soon as they are finalized. If you would like to support the project financially, I will set up options for that as well and let you know as soon as they are set up. I hope you’ll like my little labor of love!