lombas Posted September 26, 2006 Report Share Posted September 26, 2006 (edited) My sincere greetings to everyone. I'm a history student from Antwerp (Flanders). Since a couple of years my interest in "the free thing" grew and, a former communist myself, I became convinced that a free society was the only moral, realistic and "good" society. So I started reading the early classical liberal authors like Bastiat, Molinari, Guyot, Ricardo, Say &c and trying to study the history of the free minded person back to Ancient times. Eventually, of course, I ended up reading Mises, Hayek, Rothbard, the more modern libertarian thinkers ... and Rand. I'm very fond of Rand because she can write (contrary to others) and is quite straight-minded. That's probably why not so many libertarians have any problems with Randian/objectivist ideas and concepts. As for the "hippies"-thing, I couldn't care less. Me is I and myself is my own opinion - whether you call me a classical liberal, a libertarian, a freethinker, a capitalist filthy swine of a traitor (as my former comrades called me) ... or an objectivist. Though I'm a member of a libertarian club and attend libertarian meetings in Flanders and the Netherlands regurarly (there aren't so many objectivist clubs over here, and socialism dominates politics), I get rather upset by the great dividedness amongst libertarians - some advocate political activism, others prefer being hermits, there are those who call libertarianism "the Path of Jesus and the Lord" (followed by a crowd screaming "halleluja" all over), &c I read here in a topic of someone else presenting him/herself that libertarianism is a very broad perspective and people don't know if you follow Bakunin, Makhno and Chomsky or Hayek or Rothbard or whatever person on earth has written a book on libertarianism and started his or her own sub-ideology. That's why, in very recent times, I became interested more in objectivism. Though amongst objectivists as well, there are those that vote and those that don't. The lesson, I guess, is that in the free thought, everyone makes up his or her own mind - and that ideologies, writers, guide you but don't own you. It would be a very bad thing that people who follow the cause of liberty, capitalism, voluntarism &c end up like Trotskists and Stalinists: messed up and scaring off others. Edited September 26, 2006 by lombas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
softwareNerd Posted September 26, 2006 Report Share Posted September 26, 2006 Welcome to the forum. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lombas Posted September 27, 2006 Author Report Share Posted September 27, 2006 Thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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