Those that choose to follow the philosophy of Liberty are naturally diverse. The ideas of freedom and liberty are so vast and deep that many people will [and do] self-identify with them. It is difficult to separate the paradigm of Western Classical Liberalism from a palpable suspicion of centralized power. The state is an entity separate and elusive to most restraints on power. Laws that are conceived of and enforced by the state do not constrain or hinder the state. The state espouses the value of protecting the citizens, and does not eliminate violence, but simply monopolizes it. From this power concentration, most states ensure their own survival, even at the expense of the citizenry that the state claims to protect. Here is where the majority of Liberty-minded people (Libertarian, Anarchist, Anarcho-capitalist, Voluntarist, Mutualist, etc.) start to diverge in their individual interpretations of the non-aggression principle [one of the staple philosophies of Libertarianism].
When the state commits acts of ineptitude, violence, repression, or hate it is easy to attribute these actions to malice. Hanlon’s Razor splits the Libertarian population along a fault line of assumptions. One side assumes the actions or inactions of the state are due to the deep-seated corruption and malice of the system’s operators, engineers, and leaders. The other side attributes the wrongs of the state to the incompetence and ineptitude of the system [in totality] as well as the operators, engineers, and leaders. When figures in the public eye, due to fame or infamy, such as Adam Kokesh call for revolution it is troublesome for many in the Liberty-minded population. Those that believe whole-heartedly in the non-aggression principle will not commit to a movement that either instigates or benefits from violence. Should the Kokesh camp decide to initiate force against the state they will do so outside the bounds of Libertarian logic and ideology.
Unfortunately for those in the Kokesh camp, the assumption that the state’s actions or inactions are dictated by malice will only cloud their future decisions. Simply stated Kokesh is setting an equation in motion that treats the actions of the state as a variable (if you do this there will be violence, if you do that there will be peace), but the alternative assessment of the state is that it is by design a constant and not a variable. The Libertarian criticism of the Kokesh demands is not that he is asking too much, it is that he is using the nature of government as an excuse to act in kind with that government.
Although Kokesh would like to gather like-minded people to his cause, he has only set in motion a self-fulfilling prophesy of ostracizing the general populace and contradicting his core fan base of Libertarians. The only way to unite the Liberty-minded people of the United States is to adhere to the non-aggression principle and exploit social media to facilitate popular and common discourse among the voting public.
