I don't see what he is doing here as "co-opting the freedom movement". This is a video on his own web-channel, produced from his own efforts. It has no tie to the Ron Paul campaign, Campaign for Liberty, The Free State Project, Stephan Moleneux, Chuck Baldwin, Rand Paul, or anyone else in the freedom movement. This is Kokesh's view of what should be done to advance the freedom movement that he wants to see.
No one would know who Adam Kokesh was, had he not been riding on Ron Paul's coattails.
Moreover, Brittany tied the video to Ron Paul when she posted it, not only once, but twice, on RON PAUL forums.
I thought the point of the rally was to bring out atheists/humanists/agnostics (whatever they self-label) to show numbers. Kokesh wants to go there are cover the people attending, what they personally want, and try to spread the message of liberty. He said that there is a lot of self-introspection that underlies both atheism generally and libertarianism generally, and the same rational skill should be applied to both.
He actually said more than that. He implied that the logical extension of libertarianism is atheism. Perhaps he should tell that to Lew Rockwell.
There is only "fighting" coming at this point from the people that don't want to compare the two.
That's right, they shouldn't be equated. They have nothing to do with each other.
They don't want us to associate at all with people who MIGHT rub hardline GOPers the wrong way.
Nope. Nice try, but fail. Everyone is welcome. But, lying about libertarianism to try to win them over is not only ignorant, but dangerous.
The infighting has a deeper cause than introducing personal views on religion. These issues are not resolved in the non-liberty manner of stifling different opinions and hiding our true natures, they are solved by embracing ALL who agree with us on the goals and methods of letting anyone do what they wish as long as they are responsible.
Actually, some just want to start fights and cause divides by starting threads like this. I don't care what your religion is; whether that means you worship God, Buddha, science, your navel, or something else. But, if someone starts to imply, as did Adam and others in this thread, that this entire movement is atheist, then you are going to have a big fight on your hands.
If you truly want to embrace people with all faiths, then stop posting this shit.
Freedom of religion and tolerance of differences ARE a central part of this movement. Questioning authority is a part of this movement. Opposing the status quo is a part of this movement. Not applying these principles to the movement itself is the CAUSE of the in-fighting and problems.
No, the problem is not respecting someone else's faith and just leaving it alone. Too often on here, those who claim to be the staunchest libertarians use every opportunity they see to crawl in the gutter and make wisecracks about another's faith.
First, what he said isn't critical of anyone's religion. He said that applying the rational inspection required to become a libertarian should also apply to spirituality. That could lead to people truly understanding christianity rationally as a religion of peace and anti-state sentiment. That could also lead to someone determining that the world without a god makes more rational sense.
What you've assumed in your inference is that people can't believe in a christian god if they are rational. I don't think that this is true, as people can rationally be good christians. But many religious people are that way simply because they've accepted every story they've heard from birth. Many atheists are also this way. Kokesh merely said in these quotes to apply rational analysis to your convictions. Not that you couldn't be a libertarian if you weren't an atheist.
Second, even if he wanted MORE libertarians to be atheists, he never attacked anyone's choice to be religious. He was not creating "qualifiers", he's just inviting people to be introspective.
I can't really break it down more: rational introspection of one's beliefs and tolerance of personal choices are CENTRAL issues. The "in-fighting" is only occurring from the people who are denying this introspection and tolerance.
Kokesh was trying to bring in some of the people who were at this rally identifying as atheists. One great way to relate to these people is to recognize that many of us came to the liberty movement through questioning established thought in a rational manner and maybe the street goes both ways between atheism and libertarianism. He didn't pick a fight with non-libertarian atheists nor non-atheist libertarians.
We will have to agree to disagree.
