Sweden is a welfare state, if not THE welfare dtate, where money and greed are often frowned upon and defined as a disease killing our world. Even though the government of Sweden owes it's "prosperity" (it is not true prosperity since the market is controlled and the people are indebted to other countries because of the state) not to the government but to entreprenours and inventors of the past. People like Sven Wingquist, creator of the double layered radial ball bearing, took part in the build up of the Swedish market wich, unfortunately, is controlled to big parts by the government.
What is one of the fundamental pillars of Swedish values is the line:
"Alla ska med" wich means that the people are to enter the future together, no one is left behind.
Now, it seems I have painted up an exaggerated image of Sweden being absolutely socialist and if so we're not far from the truth.
The Swedish market, although full of entrepreneurs is not fully controled with laws and corporations but the climate in wich people live and work is constantly and thoroughly permeated with the Swedish government.
And that is where I realized that I am not like my peers who find this way of living comfortable and truly pleasant. I find this amount of government intervention in my life terrifying, because throughout my short existence on this planet I have been fed values and ideas through teachers, TV-programs, children books and more. the consensus of it all is always the same, that we need to take care of eachother and that everyone has equal right to everything.
At first i never thought of what I was told because I was too young and (well) stupid. That all changed when I became 15 years old and developed a sense of humor that was'nt alll about farts and funny noises, I discovered stand-up.
What started with laughing until I cried watching Chappele show ended in me finding my favorite comedian to date:
Doug Stanhope.
It was when I heard his joke from his comedy special; "Deadbeat Hero" about the expression, give a man a fish (which you all know) adapted into real life. So what happens when Doug Stanhope applies this saying to real life? You guessed it, the man who now wants to fish has to get a fishing license in order to fish and in order to do that he has to go through the bureaucratic system that is the state. The bottom line of the joke is that people are not free, not you, not me.
When i heard that joke I got a good feeling, the sort of feeling you get when you do something you find out something amazing and that you were right all along. So I started digging in to the internet and different books to listen to people much smarter than me talk about the free market, ethics, love and religion. I went from watching Milton Friedman talk, to Hayek just to then watch Neil Degrasse Tyson, Brian Cox, carl Sagan and Lawrence Krauss talk about space then back to economics where I found Mises and Milton Friedman's son David and when I also found out that Penn Jillette was a minarchist I was sold. This is a thing for me: freeedom.
But how did atheism and science (physics more than anything) affect me to become a libertarian?
Well, science and atheism teaches you to be critical to everything you hear to be true and to always check yourself and your premisses nad by learning this way of working and learning I've realized that the govermnent is completely expendable.
There is no service that the government can provide wich private companies and buisnesses can't and the biggest reason for me being an Libertarian is that I hate violence.
I hate violence and I hate violent people so therefore I cannot accept living in a society where people given power over me and all people I care about are able to limit my, and all of our, freedom by threats of violence. When the police imprison people who commit victimless crime for instance is violence instigated without reason based on that someone else knows more about what is good for that person than himself.
So in truth, I am a libertarian because the ends never justifies the means. Fact of the matter is that there are only means, the ends are for everyone to improve the way of life and the only way to get there is through the use of money, hard work and luck. The further one person goes in the search of prosperity the richer everyone will be. The creator creates for himself and that is good for everyone (paraphrasing Ayn Rand).
So I want to celebrate the true nature of man by writing my ideas and thoughts here, and the nature of man is curiosity and greed wich always end up in progress and a better life for everyone.
/Emil Mattsson
