April 20, 2015
A personal message from Jim Babka and Perry Willis, Co-Founders of Downsize DC and Co-Creators of the Zero Aggression Project
We’ve been telling you a story-in-reverse — starting at the end and moving back to the beginning. The purpose of this story is to introduce the Zero Aggression Project 3.0.
In previous episodes…
- Message #1: We explained why the Zero Aggression Principle is a superior way to recruit new libertarians
- Message #2: We took you on a tour of a Zero Aggression society.
- Message #3: We showed you the final stages of how that society was created.
Today…
We explain what happened when the Zero Aggression Principle became seen and heard by everyone, everywhere, every day.
This episode begins…
You now exist in an entirely different intellectual environment from what you knew in 2015. You experience the change daily — the Zero Aggression Principle is now a factor in EVERY political debate. It’s in the air…
Don’t threaten or initiate force, or ask politicians to do it for you.
No one can assert a need for The State to initiate force against personal conscience without being challenged on a moral basis. What a thrill this is for you! The Zero Aggression idea is literally EVERYWHERE…
- TV
- Radio
- Books
- Magazines
- Bumper stickers
- T-shirts
- The internet
- Conversation
Being challenged on a moral basis put advocates of State coercion on the defensive. They constantly had to justify their desire to coerce peaceful people. Widespread changes in belief came from this intellectual combat. More and more people…
- Rejected the idea that initiated force can be justified
- Accepted the idea that government must only use force for defensive purposes, such as criminal due process
This change in opinion created…
- The jurors who nullified laws that violate individual conscience (see message 3)
- The voters that passed local initiatives creating consumer controlled police departments (see message 2)
- The voters that passed local initiatives prohibiting the police from enforcing any state or federal law that initiates force (see message 2)
- The libertarian candidates who ran for office and won, as members of ALL parties (see message 2)
- The overwhelming public pressure that forced Congress to pass bills that allow people to opt-out of State programs (see message 3)
- The new social consensus that made possible the Zero Aggression and Voluntary Funding Amendments. (see message 3)
And you can still see this process at work all around you. Universal visibility for the Zero Aggression Principle means that people…
- Memorize the idea and its consequences, through repetition, the same way they memorized their multiplication tables
- Feel more comfortable with the idea the more they hear it
But even more important is the social confirmation that universal visibility brings. Social confirmation means that…
People considering a conversion to Zero Aggression no longer need fear that they will be ALL ALONE. Instead, they know they’ll be joining a rising tide.
You remember how it used to be…
You occasionally made progress with someone during a conversation. But the moment that person left your presence, they returned to a world filled with statist propaganda. And the next time you saw them all that progress vanished.
This “rubber-band effect” happened because statist ideas had universal visibility, while libertarian ideas did not. When that changed minds changed, and stayed changed.
But that universal visibility was expensive. From where did the money come? It’s obvious to you now how this came about. The money was there all along. It just took one simple insight to tap the source.
What was that insight?
We’ll answer that question in the next installment of our story-in-reverse. In the meantime…
If you’re not already a member of the ZAP Founders Committee please consider joining before it closes on April 30th.
Founders will be listed on the ZAP website continuously.
- Become a Founder by donating here. Or…
- If you’re already a member, raise your current listing on the roster by donating more (the names are ranked by size, cumulative)
You can take a quick tour of the new ZAP site when you visit the contribution form. Some sections are already open, and some are behind a curtain, to be unveiled after we finish our “story-in-reverse.”
Please stay tuned for the next installment of that story. And…
If you have libertarian friends who might be interested in ZAP, please forward this to them.
With high hopes for the future,
Perry Willis & Jim Babka
Co-creators, the Zero Aggression Project