Allow me to preface this by saying that I am not some rabid conservative nose- thumber who decries Obama as the apocalyptic anti-Christ.  I do not think he is gay, nor do I think Michelle is a man, and I couldn’t care less even if they were.  I define people as individuals, not members of a collection “gay, straight, black, liberal, male, female etc.”, and so the IS of a human being for me is the epicenter of what I think about them; I do not judge them according to the abstract definitions of a group, which has no meaning nor relevance beyond that of the individual.  I start and stop with the individual in all my personal judgments.  And this essay is not about an individual, it is about a idea.  So, again, this should not be taken as a criticism of Obama to the man (ad hominem).

I enjoy conspiracy theories, and I have my own opinions on 911 and Sandy Hook, but I wouldn’t stake my life on those ideas, nor are they particularly relevant to what I am most passionate about:  the Standard of Truth and Morality as being the absolute individual context of the SELF of man.  And I am also aware that the “conspiracy movement” sees a government cover-up in every dump taken inside the beltway…so, a lot of the time I’m rolling my eyes at what I hear from self-proclaimed “truth sayers” and the “underground free press” of Youtube and Facebook and WordPress (except for myself, of course -_-).  This is another reason why I eschew writing specifically about the personal issues I should take with someone I don’t even know.  It just feels too much like conspiracy writing.  And it’s not that conspiracy writing is inherently bad or wrong or foolish, it’s just not what I do.

Finally, I want to add that I make no claim to possess the knowledge necessary to morally parse President Obama’s intentions; and I have no reason to consider him an immoral human being, and every reason to consider him as upstanding a citizen as anyone else I know who shares his politics, and I know several, and they are good people whom I refuse to shun despite our deep philosophical differences.  My disagreements with Obama are the same as my disagreements with any other American, conservative or liberal, who espouses a collectivist ideology and seeks to employ the State as the operative of the functional ends of that ideology.  In the context of this essay I consider President Obama just another citizen with whom I philosophically disagree.  This essay asserting the destructive outcomes and implicit tyranny of mandatory voting should not be taken as a personal criticism of Obama the man.  I have no interest in going there at all.  I don’t know him any more than I know the majority of those with whom I disagree on Youtube, Yahoo, and Facebook.  So I won’t call him out by name as though I do.  What he says regarding his political ideas and what he does to implement them I will examine at the philosophical level as I would examine any one else’s assertions.  No less, but no more.

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So, this is sort of in keeping with the blog’s theme of the inherent despotism of Christianity in its orthodox forms, most egregiously, and arguably, the manifest evil known as Reformed Theology.  As all despotic ideologies have at their root the very same philosophical assumptions, and their promulgation of the idea that man has, in fact, no real existential seed (a metaphysic of man where he cannot own himself because he is NOT himself, by nature), one can easily insert a short essay on the glaring tyranny of collectivist political strategies, such as mandatory voting.  Or, more accurately described: voting forced upon the citizen by threat of or actual government violence to his person and/or property.  For that is precisely what it is.  Ironic that the government only ever does things “for you own good”, such as demand your vote, at your explicit expense.  That is, in proclaiming its “right” to force you to cast a vote for it, government, by fiat, not by reason, stakes its claim upon your life.  This renders all votes moot by definition.  For if the government can co-opt your time and your “choice” (a forced choice is no choice at all), then what YOU actually think or want is irrelevant by definition.  Mandatory voting then makes voting a farce, and implies that human rights are a function of government, not the other way around.  To say that you can be forced by threat of violence to exercise your “rights” renders the very definition of rights laughably absurd.  A right emanates from the existential essence of the individual.  It is a full-on part of human nature by reason…that is, there is no rational argument whatever for the idea that human individuals are not the sole and only proper owners of themselves.  None, period.  I will debate anyone, anywhere about this, to the very metaphysical core.  To argue that a man does not own himself is to argue that man is not really himself.  And if that is the argument, everything man claims to know disintegrates into a puff of nihilism. Which renders the idea of man as being the property of that which is outside of him (in Marxism, this would be the State; in Reformed Orthodoxy, this would be the Church; in socialism, this would be the Class; in the modern day chattel slave trade by political self-appointed anthropologists, this would be the Race) moot by definition.  And more than moot, objectively false and observably destructive.

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A “right” is something you may do, not something you must do.  If you must do something–especially within the context of the State compelling the specific behavior of the citizen–then implicit is the idea that someone else must and will rightly force you into this behavior, either by psychological violence such as threats and intimidation, or physical violence such as fines, imprisonment, and the commandeering of non-financial personal property.  And implicit in this notion is the fact that when force is the primary catalyst for behavior, reason and moral consistency are utterly irrelevant; which makes subjugation, and ultimately categorical human destruction on every level, the primary existential objective, period.  And it is from this place that the assumptions which drive the actions of the State are spawned.

On a side note, it thus behooves us to assert ourselves at the fundamental philosophical core of all actions and ideas initiated by government which are to be thrust upon the people “for their own good”, or for the “collective good” which is merely an appeal to Marxist Collectivism.  We should not be content to argue them from places which are strictly practical, political, or logistical.  The only real winner in any argument is the one who can appeal to rational consistency (the uninterrupted thread of reason), and this always finds its way to philosophy; and specifically the metaphysics of reality and the definition of man.  And it is here, and only here, that the lovers of liberty will find themselves armored in the invincibility of their own ideas, stemming from the absolutely unbreakable fact of their own IS of SELF. It is here where no collectivist, gnostic, determinist, socialist, nor even scientific empiricist can observe us moved by any argument whatever.  For the seed of all reason is man’s absolute context of SELF.  And it is here, at the ineffable and immeasurably valuable place of the individual soul, that all Truth, Morality, and Reality find their supreme Reference.

With ideas such as mandatory voting (and many others) the individual’s will and his inexorable and unshakable trending of self-realization and actualization are absolutely and absolutely irrationally subordinated to government violence.  This is the unavoidable political manifestation of all collectivist philosophies.  And, as far as the individual is concerned, it should be understood and remembered that actions taken by a government which functions from collectivist assumptions is simply government violence for the sake of violence. 

Let me say that again.  Collectivist action by a central authority is merely violence fort the sake of violence.  Period.

What I mean is that there is no other inexorable nor inevitable nor rational outcome of collectivist action by a central authority other than the unequivocal destruction of all which is said to oppose or be “outside” of that central authority, and this destructive action is legitimized by the root collectivist philosophical assumptions (of Marxism, socialism, fascism, racism, monarchism, nationalism, etc.).  In all collectivist philosophies the State must exist for its own sake.  And its own sake is violence.  Because violence is its sole and absolute purpose, and this outcome is inexorably demanded by the root assumption. Namely, that the State owns man.

Violence then for violence’s sake; for the State IS violence.  It is FORCE.  It is AUTHORITY (which is the same thing).  (Incidentally, the very same thing can be said for “God” as defined by almost all “orthodox” versions of Christianity, but particularly neo-Calvinism and its psychological guillotine of Reformed Theology).  The State which seeks to govern the people specifically against their will by appealing to its authority to act on behalf of the abstraction of “the common good” only knows itself by violence; proclaims itself by violence; exists for the sole purpose of manifesting violence, because the individual must be subdued, and violence is the most efficient and effective means by which to subdue him.  And even more, since rational discussion is not possible, because State authority trumps reason, violence is the only way to subdue him.  Without violence then, there is no State…there is no government according to the collectivist philosophy which declares it perfectly moral and perfectly reasonable for the government to compel the “free” exercise of the “rights” of the individual citizen.  The philosophical assumption behind such an idea demands either the explicit or implicit, tacit or overt concession that the State’s sole purpose is to exert its authority because the State IS authority at its root metaphysical level.  It has no reason nor claim to existence beyond this.  That is, if it is not destroying, it is not existing. 

Government force and human rights are mutually exclusive ideas.  Once your behavior as a free person is forced by threats and violence, and this by appealing to authority, even if under the auspices of manifesting “rights”, such as the right to vote, individuality is denied.  And if you are not an individual, you can possess no rights.  In the case of mandatory voting, voting in this context can no longer be rationally considered a right.  Rather, it is a means by which the government seeks to enlarge its sphere of control.  And as I have already said, this nullifies the vote by definition.  Every vote becomes a vote for the categorical authority of the State to do what it pleases.  A government which compels the practice of one’s “rights” is a government which declares these “rights” a function of the government, not of the individual.  Which means only the government actually possesses rights, and thus the individual as a plumb line for truth and morality is dismissed.  And once this is done, the metaphysical legitimacy and actuality of the individual cannot be claimed.  Which means YOU don’t exist as YOU proper.  You are only you insofar as you are a categorical instrument of the State.  The State owns you, and will dispose of you as it sees fit.  This nullifies you absolutely.  There is no longer any definition of the SELF; and this incidentally is the metaphysical plague of Christianity since Augustine, and why “orthodox” Christianity, and indeed all institutional religions I would argue, should be avoided as one would avoid an open manhole in the street.  The vote in this context is nothing more than deception.   A means by which to placate the unwashed masses and to assuage their criticism, by putting on a giant spectacle of playing at democracy every couple of years, while actually implementing and philosophically reinforcing autocracy.  And the sad thing is…well, watch how many of your friends and neighbors fall for it.  It is head-shakingly depressing.

Compulsory voting renders voting moot.  In this context, one is no longer voting, one is an accomplice to tyranny.