1. Those who use violence to try and bring about social change are political radicals. BLM, Antifa, the Alt-Right, and what I will term Radical Trumpsters see violence as a valid means to achieve their particular ends. It doesn’t matter what their ends are because even they don’t see them as valid enough, or their arguments for them as strong enough, to stand up in the marketplace of ideas. Instead of convincing people they have to rely on coercing people. Instead of the democratic process they desire tyrannical control. Therefore, instead of freedom they deserve prison.
2. Those who excuse rioters from…

The Freedom House research institute claims that the past fourteen years, 2005–2019, has been marked by a continuous democratic decline; that is, each year there were more countries falling to lower freedom scores than there were countries that improved. While democracies still make up a majority of the world’s nations, which wasn’t the case just a few decades ago, the consistency of this decline is worrying.

This essay will outline some theories of democratization as potential reasons for its decreasing success as well as examine case studies of particular countries to showcase the points of these theories. It will then…

With the radical left attempting to destroy most of what makes America good, political division is growing and the secession of part of the country is becoming more and more likely.

I certainly do not hope for this outcome and believe everything should be done to prevent it, but if there comes a choice between transforming America into the Orwellian dystopia of the radical left or ending the Union that has lasted for so long and survived so much, I’d have to choose the latter.

Not only do I believe this choice would be the lesser of the two evils…

These are the essays I’ve written that I believe present the best arguments on philosophical and political topics. Feel free to disagree with that assessment, and I will feel free to tell you why you’re wrong :)

The Triangle of Belief

Tying Philosophy to Politics

There have always been flaws in the way societies are structured, ever since societies were first structured. As a result of these pervasive imperfections, discontentment is common and from it arises ideas on how to fix the imperfections. Politics can be defined as the invention and consideration of these ideas in order to find the ones most likely to improve society, and the implementation of those that are accepted.

One method of politics is Utopianism: imagining a perfect society and then acting to try and achieve it. At first glance, this seems like an appealing type of politics as it…

Clarification:

In the last essay, I pointed out that cancel culture is like violence in that it can only be prevented by the threat of retaliation, and I used a quote by Philosopher Karl Popper about violence as this analogy. However, I now believe I need to include more of that quote to better convey the message I intended:

If he is willing to listen to your arguments without shooting [canceling] you, then he is at least infected by rationalism, and you may, perhaps, win him over. This is why arguing is no waste of time — as long as people…

Most people want to improve society so most people hold political beliefs that they think will best accomplish that goal. But, since most people arrive at their beliefs this way, why is there so much ugly political conflict these days?

Shouldn’t people who want to improve society be able to have a civil discussion with each other about their differing beliefs? Seemingly, if their motives are true, they’d actually welcome disagreement because they’d recognize that the only way to be sure of the most beneficial policies is to see if they withstand challenge.

In his essay “Utopia and Violence,” Philosopher…