government” – the notion that some people actually have the moral right to rule over others – has caused immeasurable pain and suffering, injustice and oppression, enslavement and death.

Tribalism is an addiction that is driven by false beliefs that need to be reflected back to be perceived as true.

There’s a huge swath of humanity that has developed verbal abilities to extract resources from guilt-ridden people.They used to be priests, and now they’re leftists.

Government should never be able to do anything you can’t do. If you can’t steal from your neighbor, you can’t send the government to steal for you.

Nationalism does nothing but teach you to hate people you never met, and to take pride in accomplishments you had no part in.

The fact is that the government, like a highwayman, says to a man: Your money, or your life…The government does not, indeed, waylay a man in a lonely place, spring upon him from the road...

Ultimately, we need to take control over the money supply out of the hands of our governments and make the production of money again subject to the principle of free association. The first step to...

Using coercion to drive charity is like using kidnapping to create love.

Emergencies” have always been the pretext on which the safeguards of individual liberty have eroded.

The overwhelming tendency of markets is to bring people together, break down prejudices, persuade people of the need to cooperate regardless of class, race, religion, sex/gender, and physical ability. The same is obviously and especially...

If you personally advocate that I be caged if I don’t pay for whatever “government” things YOU want, please don’t pretend to be tolerant, or non-violent, or enlightened, or compassionate. Don’t pretend you believe in...

Deep pockets and empty hearts rule the world. We unleash them at our peril.

We are supposed to call poison medicine and we wonder why we’re always sick.

Politically, the goal of today’s dominant trendis statism. Philosophically, the goal is theobliteration of reason;psychologically, it is theerosion of ambition.

Liberty should be understood as freedom from the government, specifically, freedom from the initiation of physical force by the government.

If the bulk of the public were really convinced of the illegitimacy of the State, if it were convinced that the State is nothing more nor less than a bandit gang writ large, then the...

The ones who are insane enough to think that they can rule the world are always the ones who do.

Democracy without respect for individual rights sucks. It’s just ganging up against the weird kid, and I’m always the weird kid.

The phenomenon of economic ignorance is so widespread, and its consequences so frightening, that the objective of reducing that ignorance becomes a goal invested with independent moral worth.

Le fait est que le gouvernement, comme un bandit de grand chemin, dit à un individu: “La bourse ou la vie.” Quantité de taxes, ou même la plupart, sont payées sous la contrainte d’une telle...

Liberty is no less a blessing because oppression has so long darkened the mind that it can not appreciate it.

Government is a gun that shoots money at your enemy and blows up in your face.

The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience.

The disdain of profit is due to ignorance, and to an attitude that we may if we wish admire in the ascetic who has chosen to be content with a small share of the riches...

Ultimately, all arguments against markets are arguments against anarchy. Marx understood this much, at least.

Having a Constitutional political party is a little like telling a car-jacker, “You’re not allowed to do what you’re doing! And if you don’t stop it right now, we are going to ask you to...

The paralysis of potential is essential to the manufacturing of victims.

An atheist who is a statist is just another theist.

If government half a century ago had provided us with all our dinners and breakfasts, it would be the practice of our orators today to assume the impossibility of our providing for ourselves.

The man who is not permitted to own is owned.

The first people to get the new money are the counterfeiters, which they use to buy various goods and services. The second receivers of the new money are the retailers who sell those goods to...

Ever wonder why the media never refers to 18 or 19 year old American soldiers as “armed teens”?

No state, no government exists. What does in fact exist is a man, or a few men, in power over many men.

The sick in soul insist that it is humanity that is sick, and they are the surgeons to operate on it. They want to turn the world into a sickroom. And once they get humanity...

Comme l’impôt est obligatoire pour tous, qu’ils votent ou non, une large proportion de ceux qui votent le font sans aucun doute pour éviter que leur propre argent ne soit utilisé contre eux; alors que,...

As I explain in ‘What It Means to be an Anarcho-Capitalist’, to be an anarchist simply means you oppose aggression, and you realize the state necessarily commits aggression. If you are not an anarchist, it...

Democracy is a suggestion box for slaves.

All laws which can be violated without doing any one any injury are laughed at. Nay, so far are they from doing anything to control the desires and passions of men that, on the contrary,...

It is be­cause freedom means the renun­ciation of direct control of individual efforts that a free society can make use of so much more knowledge than the mind of the wisest ruler could comprehend.

When the state itself is held to the same moral standards as everyone else, it dies. And that’s a wonderful thing.

I’m not scared of the Maos and the Stalins and the Hitlers. I’m scared of the thousands of millions of people that hallucinate them to be “authority”, and so do their bidding, and pay for...

Statism is an unnatural disaster.

It takes a huge amount of culture to normalize “crazy”, and of course that’s its main focus

After Napoleon’s 1815 defeat at Waterloo, Europeans had created nation-states in the image and likeness of Napoleon. The new states became the foci of popular affection, even worship. All organized themselves as Napoleon had France,...

A free and prosperous society has no fear of anyone entering it. But a welfare state is scared to death of every poor person who tries to get in and every rich person who tries...

The very term ‘public utility’ … is an absurd one. Every good is useful ‘to the public,’ and almost every good … may be considered ‘necessary.’ Any designation of a few industries as ‘public utilities’...

Distraction serves evil more than any other mental state.

Income inequality has no necessary connection with poverty, the lack of material resources for a decent life, such as adequate food, shelter, and clothing. A society with great income inequality may have no poor people,...

Experience teaches effectually, but brutally. It makes us acquainted with all the effects of an action, by causing us to feel them; and we cannot fail to finish by knowing that fire burns, if we...

we,” like football fans talking about the home team.