My Dad: The OG Anarchist

He gave me the best gift

My father had a terrible childhood. His parents divorced after the end of World War II. His mother supported herself by singing in Chicago night clubs, often for Al Capone and other Chicago mobsters. When my father and his twin sister were about 3 or 4 she decided she had enough of them and dropped them off at a Chicago orphanage to live. She wouldn’t let them be adopted because she wanted to be able to see them, she just didn’t want the responsibility.

My father suffered severe psychological trauma from his time at the “home” as he always referred to it. Towards the end of his life, he was more open about his experiences there and would tell me about them. One of the more tame stories he told was when they left his twin taped to the toilet and he could hear her blood curdling screams all night. He told me that they were both sexually abused by the staff and other residents. How he became a functioning member of society is beyond me because what he endured would be enough to drive anyone insane.

My father never knew love as a child. He was strict, things were his way or the highway, but he also had a soft side that I would catch a glimpse of when he watched movies or when he heard stories about abused children. Because of his childhood, it was difficult for him to show love in the typical way, he did in a way that I didn’t entirely understand until now. Now that I’m older, I can finally understand the reasons he did what he did and how much he really did love me.

My father showed his love for me in a way many people don’t get the honor of having. My father passed on to me a foundation of principles to base my life on that most people don’t hear until they’re adults and seek out these ideals. My father raised me as an anarchist.

My father instilled in me a respect for property rights. He always told me that property rights are your right to life. If you can’t own property, you have nothing. And he lived this principle in our house. While most of my friends were getting their toys taken away for punishment, my dad never ever took anything away from us that he gave us. He was adamant that once he gave it to us it was ours and he had no right to take it away. I remember my parents arguing about this at times. And if we ever violated our siblings property rights, we were in some deep trouble. The only spanking I ever got was because I was playing with my sisters toys without asking. I never did that again.

Something else that was different about our house was our right to privacy. My parents never went through our backpacks, purses, or rooms. In fact, my father would not even go into my room without asking. I remember one day he was fixing a drawer for me and I had something in the drawer underneath the one he was fixing that I didn’t want him to see. He reached to open it, and I said, “dad please don’t open that drawer.” He looked at me and said, “ok”. Took his hand off the drawer and never spoke of it again. We were given a level of trust that most parents don’t give their kids. I will forever be grateful for that and I have carried this on with my own kids. I have never once gone though my children’s backpack, phone, or room, and they have never made me regret that decision.

The most important thing my father taught me was to not trust anything from the government. I believe my father’s upbringing made him distrustful of authority and that distrust is what sparked my fathers extensive research into the government and its failings. As a young child, my father taught me about sovereignty, self ownership, and Austrian economics. He quoted Mises, Spooner, Hayek, and Freidman. He taught me about Chisholm vs Georgia, Warren vs DC, and countless other important cases that I can’t even remember. He was a voracious reader who never ever stopped learning and he lovingly passed all that onto me.

He was the original conspiracy theorist. He taught me about the Tuskegee Experiments, Operation Mockingbird, Operation Northwoods, false flags, and I remember his lectures about FDR and how he prolonged the Depression and how he had foreknowledge about the attack on Pearl Harbor but did nothing to stop it.

He was constantly telling me that the only authority they have over you is what you give them. If you don’t stand up and fight for your rights, no one will. He taught me about fiat currency and the impending crash of the dollar. He always warned me of martial law and how they are slowly infringing on your rights and if you let them take one, its consent for them to take others. He always told me to guard my freedom jealously.

He was constantly warning me about the changing of language and that if I didn’t know the meaning of words and know what ground I stood on, I would be easily led astray. He always cautioned that it was a Marxist technique to change the meaning of words and to use slang to divide parents and kids. Traditions were what held societies together and to get the kids to reject the parents old ways was their way taking over and destroying our culture. He would not let me say the pledge of allegiance at school, telling me that it was created by a socialist and pledging your allegiance to something was a form of idolatry and worship.

It wasn’t always easy living in my parents house. I spent a lot of my childhood terrified. Some of the things he taught me scared me to death and I’m still dealing with anxiety from that. Because he always talked about the collapse, it was hard for me to make plans for the future. I was always waiting for everything to fall apart. Sometimes I felt like the knowledge I had was more of a burden. It was hard to enjoy things when you see through the façade. There were times I desperately wanted to get away from it all and just live like a “normal” person. In grade school my second grade teacher was always mean to me and I swear it didn’t start until my dad instructed her that I was not to say the Pledge every morning. It really was hard at times.

As I matured, however, I began to realize how important and what a gift all the things my father taught me were. I was given the gift of true individualism. I was taught from the beginning of my life the things most people don’t encounter until later. My upbringing made me tough. It made me realize the value of non conformity and that it’s best to not be part of the system. And despite the challenges that entails it’s always advantageous to be on the side of freedom and liberty for all and not just a select few.

As a parent, I’ve tried to instill those same principles to my children. I feel like I’ve failed to a degree though. My father inculcated those ideals in me from the beginning and I truly didn’t understand how important they were until I was much older and as a result didn’t drive them into my kids as hard as my father did with me. My only hope now is that my children learn from my example.

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