The Dissident Dad – 10 Things I Had to Unlearn That My Children Won’t

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This list could grow to 1,000 ideas, but I’ve kept it down to ten. In the future, I might update it and add some more.

There are a lot of bad ideas that dominate the world we live in today, most of which are uncritically accepted as the norm and fully embraced by society.

As a millennial myself, I’ve noticed my peers seem to accept most of these as conventional wisdom. Hook, line, and sinker.

Here are some ideas I was propagandized with that I hope my children will never have to “unlearn.”

1. Violence is normal.

Presidential candidates today are fighting over who can kill better by using drones or boots on the ground. By constantly threatening the use of violence against other countries, statists have conditioned the population into thinking that killing tens of thousands of people is normal behavior, instead of the immoral, dangerous provocation it is. Rather than being charged with murder, politicians and others that help support this behavior are often paid $250,000 or more a speech after they leave office, and referred to as Mr. President or former Chairman of the Federal Reserve.

Video games, movies, television shows, and even toys all have a common theme: death and destruction. For example, there’s nothing like teaching your child about policing in 2015 America via these Playmobil toys:

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This isn’t normal; this is psychotic. And the sociopaths that rule over us are murdering and imprisoning people every day because “we the people” are not only allowing it, but often times, cheering it on.

Outside of self-defense, respecting other peoples’ property should become the new norm.

2. Political parties govern differently. 

As a former Republican, I used to hate the Democrats. Now I see these two parties as just two wings on the same beast.

It’s true that they run with different themes and talking points, but in the end, they govern the same. They share the top donors, vote yes on the same wars, and never roll back a single thing the other does once in power.

Bush picked Bernanke to run the Fed, and Obama re-nominated him. Republicans like Nixon ran on an anti-war platform during the Vietnam era, until Reagan/Bush took over in the 80’s. Then the Democrats were anti-war in the 2000s, until Obama took over in 2008. Clinton, Bush, Obama… looking back at the last 25 years, I don’t see how anything has changed in the U.S. with regard to foreign policy, spending, or lying about U.S. economic data.

The oligarchs have us all fooled. Political parties are nothing more than spectator sport for a dumbed down public.

3. Patriotism is a virtue. 

Why? It was an accident that I was born here. Am I grateful to be living in the U.S., surrounded by family and friends? Yes. All the same, I owe the U.S. government nothing. I am a sovereign man, and shouldn’t have to subscribe to any group or nation just because I happened to be born in a part of the world called North America.

I love everyone in this world, and I am not going to express loyalty for a specific region like a sports fan who loves his team only because it’s in the same city he resides in.

Governments are dangerous, and the U.S. is the most dangerous one at the moment. My love for the U.S. is no more than my love for the Bahamas or Europe.

4. Illegal aliens are evil criminals who desire to collect welfare from taxpayers.

For a long time, I couldn’t stand these people. Nevertheless, if I wasn’t randomly born in Los Angeles and was instead born just 144 miles south, in Tijuana, I would be doing the exact same thing the illegal aliens are doing. I would be attempting to better my life and my children’s lives by migrating north. Humans moving to different regions is a natural event; the only unnatural thing is the imaginary lines we call borders.

As far as the welfare, that’s a symptom of the disease we call government. It’s like me taking a tax deduction. While I don’t support the income tax, I’m not stupid, and I’m going to do everything I can to game the system and benefit myself.

5. Taxes are justified at gunpoint.

Taxes with the threat of jail or violence is wrong. I’m sorry, but I don’t owe you or anybody else a portion of the fruits of my labor – especially not under the threat of violence.

6. War is good for the economy.

I was told at a very young age, and even in high school, that war helped the economy boom. When you think about it, it makes no sense. Using production lines to create products that blow up into nothing is a tremendous waste of resources. Looking back, after WWII the U.S. cut spending by 50% and reduced the military from 12 million to 1.5 million. The evidence from the late 40’s and 50’s is that the economy boomed when we had less war.

7. Terrorists hate our freedom and culture. 

Are there extremists? Absolutely. But the fact is the U.S. has troops in so many countries (see: The Golden Age of Black Ops – In Fiscal 2015 U.S. Special Forces Have Already Deployed to 105 Nations), and has a horrible track record of toppling democratically elected governments, supporting sociopaths, and arming rebels who later become “terrorists.” It’s no wonder than these policies occasionally come home to roost.

For one second, imagine that a nation bombed your neighbor and killed your son. What would your reaction be? These are the situations thousands across the world face on a consistent basis.

What if Iran had troops in Mexico and Canada, ships off our coasts, and drones over our air space? Would we want a nuclear bomb for defense?

George Washington was a terrorist in the eyes of Great Britain. If you want to know who’s dishing out much of the tyranny and chaos in the Middle East, as an American, you don’t have to look far from home.

8. The U.S. has a free market economy.

This is seriously stupid, but college professors and politicians repeat this mantra every day. In reality, the economy is so centrally planned that if the Fed alters one sentence in their statement, the Dow Jones could rally or fall by 200 points in an hour.

Here’s another fact. Nearly 50% of America’s EBT program in Oklahoma went straight to the coffers of one company: Walmart.

Meanwhile, regulations in some industries have forced business to have an entire division dedicated just to compliance. Even worse, many of these regulations are pushed by the larger corporations in order to drown out the competition with bureaucracy they can’t possibly afford.

There is no free market in the U.S. – only crony capitalism, manipulation, and a centrally planned system manned by busybodies.

9. U.S. troops are dying for my freedom.

This is a tough one, because you want to naturally love and respect anyone who does something for you, especially if it’s to protect you from harm. The only reason I even bring this up is because many of the troops are honest, decent young men looking to serve their country or be a part of something greater than themselves. Nevertheless, these men and women are merely being used and abused in a Game of Thrones-esque battle for global wealth and power. They are often just collateral damage for large corporations looking to expand their businesses into territories and countries that, without U.S. military intervention, would likely be thrown out by the locals.

I genuinely think the troops are willing to die for my freedom, but the corrupt American Empire poses a much greater threat to my freedom than any outside enemy we are constantly taught to fear.

10. My vote matters. 

Remember in 2006 when the Democrats were going to get our fiscal house in order? Or was that in 2010, when the Republicans were going to do the same? I don’t know, but your vote doesn’t matter. The populace is easily manipulated and/or asleep when it comes to matters of importance, so why bother.

The vote counters and the media have already decided who’s acceptable and, of course, at the end of those strings are the oligarchs who run the world. See my post from last year: Election 2014 – Why I Opt Out of Voting.

Edward Snowden sacrificed his freedom to alert voters of high crimes in the U.S government, and many Americans have no idea who he is. Meanwhile, most politicians want to try him for treason.

Summary: The good news is that because of the communications revolution we are in right now, I truly feel like there is a great awakening happening. We see it in the alternative media boom, blogs like Liberty Blitzkrieg, ZeroHedge, and others are currently challenging conventional wisdom with ferocity and success.

We need to keep fighting.

– Daniel Ameduri aka The Dissident Dad

For more info see this author’s bio.

11 thoughts on “The Dissident Dad – 10 Things I Had to Unlearn That My Children Won’t”

  1. Very interesting post. I agree with all points except one, which I’m confused about – taxes.

    The points make it sound like you’re a recovering right wing libertarian (I use the term “right wing” since – as I assume you know – libertarianism began as a left-wing non-statist socialist movement; or actually, anti-statist). I’ve heard people like Michelle Bachmann and other libertarian oriented folks declare that ANY taxation is socialism.

    My first inclination would be to say, if you don’t like taxes that’s fine, but then, the alternative would seem to me to be to move to (or create?) another country where the people who wrote the founding documents decided to try an experiment unique in human history – create a government that exists without any contributions from its members (I’d say, you could try Somalia, which basically has no effective government; but it would probably get too complex – I’ve read a number of libertarian commentators who defend themselves by saying Somalia is not “really” a libertarian paradise, but I’ve never seen the logic in their arguments).

    So, I have two questions:

    1. Do you think the people who wrote or were associated with the writing of the American constitution (Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Adams, Madison, Hamilton, etc) were fascist dictators who only wanted to subdue the poor members of the country by force? If not, do you think it was a massive mistake on their part to create a document which required taxation to fund the country? Perhaps you think the US should simply incorporate and run itself like a business, earning whatever money it can by selling off portions of the land? (leave aside the question of progressive taxation, which of course was off the table in the late 1700s – though Thomas Paine was actually for it; leave that for now and assume a flat tax, which most libertarians – except Michelle Bachman, I guess – I’m aware of feel ok about)

    2. Do you disagree with most libertarians (actually, and conservatives and Republicans and Democrats and liberals and progressives and well, just about everyone on the planet) that some kind of military is a necessary part of government, that if 19 guys from Saudi Arabia hijack a plane and fly it into a building in a major city in the US, it might not be a bad idea for the government to have some kind of military response? If you think it’s ok for the government to have a military and you think nobody should be forced to pay taxes, how would you fund the military? Bake sales? Cable subscriptions to a government run channel? Rock concerts with congressman and women playing various instruments?

    I’m continually fascinated with libertarian thinking. There’s a guy on our local Asheville station who repeats endlessly that government should get out of everything but military and policing. He just wrote an article a few weeks ago for the local Asheville paper criticizing an idiotic North Carolina representative who said it was fascist government intervention to require restaurant employees to wash their hands. He said instead, they should just have a sign in their restaurant indicating that the employees are “FREE” to choose whether to wash their hands or not. Our libertarian commentator first quite sagely pointed out that that was still the government requiring the restaurant to post the sign! (duh!) and that he (the libertarian) was perfectly happy to have the government require the employees to wash their hands, because when it came to his own food safety, he didn’t mind a little government intervention.

    I’d love to hear what he has to say about the Duke Energy plant spewing clouds of toxins near the radio station where he works. Don’t let the government interfere! No crony capitalism! Let the free market work!!

    Anyway, I’ll be interested to hear your reflections on the idiocy of the founding fathers and the need for private businesses to take over the military (or for the government to transform itself into a business to run the military and the police) so that we won’t have to pay any taxes any more.

    Reply
    • Please look up the central tenet of libertarianism called the nonaggression principle. That principle along with property rights is the core of this philosophy.

      Also, Somalia is a FAILED STATE whose subsequent tribal gang rulers are just trying to form new states using violence and have no understanding of freedom or these principles. However, despite all that, they’re still doing better than before based on economic data over the past few years as the common folks are free to do to most things and hassled less by bureaucrats.

    • Donsalmon,
      I highly recommend watching the excellent documentary ‘From Freedom to Fascism’ by Aaron Russo. I believe it will answer your questions:

  2. Very good list with the exception of number four. Every society needs to protect its interests which means property rights and collective protection from outside attack. Borders are a traditional way to determine who ‘belongs’ and who does not. Rules can be agreed upon as to how to allow the flow of people to that internal group. Open borders leads eventually to some size of uncontrollable landscape and renders any internal agreement moot.

    Its often a theme of compassion which is used to justify open borders instead of the rationality of pragmatism. I understand both, I hope, and try to know when I am being emotionally manipulated to accept something which is neither rational nor pragmatic.

    There is a dogma amoung some libertarians which goes a bridge too far by declaring borders have no place in a free and tolerant society. This may be true but that kind of society has yet to exist and will not be held without vigilant and thoughtful protection.

    Tom Moylan

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  3. One thing was right: “Edward Snowden sacrificed his freedom to alert voters of high crimes in the U.S government, and many Americans have no idea who he is. Meanwhile, most politicians want to try him for treason.”

    Reply
    • JoshuAloha, I am not sure what your post means. If still waking up and stuck in the old paradigm means wanting to stop over sixty years of the abusive application of the state secrets privilege and related doctrine, act, executive order, regulation and related policy abuses means stuck then I am stuck. Senator Rand Paul is the only person to show the will to stop this abuse. More power to him. I am stuck on him.

  4. I love this piece. However i take exception to the use of psychosis and psychopathy as somehow interchangable. In common parlance psychosis would be more used in terms of schizophrenic or schizoid and depressive or anxiety conditions where there is a break with accepted normal ‘reality’. eg ‘i can fly’, OCD symptoms. Most people with psychosis would not harm a fly and normally the only violence committed is towards themselves through suicide (although in some tragic exceptions we see others harmed).

    In psychopathy we see very manipulative behaviour that has no empathy for others at all. The only vulnerable spot is that they dont like to look bad in public. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/beautiful-minds/201103/psychotic-is-not-the-same-psychopathic

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  5. But, the oxymoron for a blog name might just make your message a little less credible.

    There Never Was a Good War or a Bad Peace: Ben Franklin

    More clearly stated:
    Wars are bad and peace is good.

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  6. I can agree with a lot of what you have to say, apart from 3 and 4.

    Yes, we are all nationals of one country or another by an accident of birth, but I could say too that I am part of my family by a similar act of chance, because of that “accident of birth” I was entitled to live in my parents house along with everything else that entails. There is nothing wrong with denying someone else to live in your house, so why is it wrong to deny them to live in your nation?

    It is the same with nations as with families, we decided we were one people who inhabited one land and thus a nation, the people decide how they are going to organise themselves in that land. Being American means you have a right to live in America just as being British gives me a right to live in the UK. There is nothing evil in the fact that I have no right to live and work in the US right now, I respect that I would only be allowed to emigrate to America if I was judged to be a particular benefit to the country. In this case my skills would have to be in high demand, and I was also (hopefully!) judged to not hate America too…

    So I disagree there is anything wrong with denying foreigners the right to live and work in your country, what is important in the end is that each country organises its affairs for the best benefits of its people. If that is done then the people have more money to buy foreign goods, or invest in foreign countries, acts that always bring benefits to all.

    When we don’t organise our affairs to our best advantage we end up tied up with massive deficit spending and constrained by a huge debt, so I would argue today we think too little on how we should organise our own countries for our own benefit, and this is a root cause of much of the dysfunction in the world economy.

    Reply

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