Answering a Freedom Meme

Brad Spangler has answered an interesting freedom-oriented meme, and tags me to do likewise. The question is: “What motivated you to start looking into Anarchist/Libertarian thought?” So, here goes my answer.

The shortest answer I can give is Rush. To expand on that a bit, I had been a hardcore Rush fan for several years, attracted by their complex music and individualistic, intelligent lyrics. One day I was in a book store, trying to find something good to read for an upcoming flight; I remembered that their album 2112 had been dedicated “to the genius of Ayn Rand” and searched for something by her. As I recall, the store stocked several of her nonfiction books, but I picked up The Fountainhead. I thought a book of that size would last me for the flight, down time during the trip, and the flight home, but I was immediately captivated and finished the book the first full day of the trip. I spent the rest of the trip in something of a daze ... as if my senses were fully working for the first time in my life. It was the first time I had encountered something from a person who’d had thoughts similar to many of mine ... who valued individuals above groups, as I had done all my life as far as I could tell. I was hungry for more.

I joined an online Objectivist group and mostly lurked until someone asked a similar question to the one I’m long-windedly answering now. I spilled out my story (more lyrically and in greater detail than above); and it brought several personal responses. One of those was Lobo; I replied to him and our friendship was off to a galloping start. He introduced me to libertarianism and the LP ... but within three days or so of thinking about it, I concluded that the most consistent pro-freedom position is anarchism. I used to call myself an anarcho-capitalist, but recently realized that agorism is more consistent with my view.

This meme doesn’t come with a set of rules regarding tagging others. There are many people I’d like to see answer this question, but rather than hog the fun, I’ll limit myself to three—individuals I haven’t interviewed, as I usually ask a few questions of this nature therein: Happy Curmudgeon; lewlew; and NeoWayland.