willingess to defy authority

If You Love Your Freedom, Thank a Dirty Effing Hippie por Kevin Carson:

If you believe freedom is something granted by states and other forms of authority, out of the goodness of their hearts, you’re sadly mistaken. And if you call yourself a “small government conservative” yet worship authority in the guise of armed and uniformed state functionaries — the very means by which the state enforces its authority — you’re delusional or worse.

As anarchist Rudolf Rocker argued, our freedom results, not from the state, but from the people’s willingess to defy authority and to resist its encroachments on our freedom. Far from being granted by the state and defended by its armed functionaries, our rights exist because we forced them on the state — very much against its will — from below. And we keep those rights, not because American troops kick down doors in Baghdad or drones massacre wedding parties in Afghanistan, but because ordinary people raise hell and refuse to obey the state here at home.