I understand Echidne of the Snakes drew our attention to this astonishing moment of “Exit, stage right” from a libertarian. I admit that for a very long time I thought libertarians, as such, didn't exist—that they were a kind of made up foil, an internet myth, used by leftist mommies to explain to their children why the farthest right form of social organization would lead, via libertarian anarchy, to corporate fascism and then social death. At least that's how I used it. But here, apparently, is the real deal. I apologize to everyone I ever derided. These people exist, they are stuck in some early teenage hell of solipsism and death anxiety, and they are going galt to boot. At least emotionally. What else are we to make of Peter Thiel's opening paragraph:
“I remain committed to the faith of my teenage years: to authentic human freedom as a precondition for the highest good. I stand against confiscatory taxes, totalitarian collectives, and the ideology of the inevitability of the death of every individual. For all these reasons, I still call myself “libertarian.””He “stands against...the ideology of the inevitability of the death of every individual?” Straight outta The Life of Brian. But now we have the answer to who learns at the knee of Glenn Reynolds. I take it that this is a tip o' the hat to either cryogenics or robotology. Still, good luck with that. Me, I was standing against “the ideology of the inevitability of death” too until I realized that I had crossed the threshold from non cancerous to “pre-cancerous.” I tried calling myself a lot of things—a member of the “loony party” or the "its not really happening to me party” or, in my five year old's felicitious phrase a member of the “but the real people don't die party” but although many of them would accept money to join it turned out that none of them had a real plan for beating that darned ideology at the polls.
** edited to add--apologies to Amanda at Pandagon. I think it was she, apparently, and not Echidne (whose post I couldn't find) who took down Paul Thiel. Now she's scrapping with Andrew Sullivan over it. Who knew that Stingray had such an illustrious following?
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