When liberals and conservatives take a good look at themselves and genuinely strive for logical consistency, they wind up turning into libertarians and voluntaryists.
Both liberals and conservatives share the belief that society needs a safety net that only a mighty, centralized state can provide. The only real difference is that liberals prefer a social safety net to provide free education, medical care, housing, food, and, increasingly, disposable income and leisure activities. Conservatives want a moral safety net, a government authority responsible for enforcing what they see as good behavior and condemning what they see as bad behavior.
I woke up, shut off my alarm, and started to get out of bed. I noticed that for the third straight day I woke up with a numb left hand. The week prior to that I had dealt with a slight tingling sensation, but it usually wore off throughout the day. But now it was preventing me from functioning.
Most people are unaware of the silent warfare that has been waged between two distinctly different philosophies in the field of medicine. It has been raging for well over one hundred years in America alone and with the passage of the so-called Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, better known as “Obamacare,” it may just be the death-knell for homeopathic medicine. The anarchist community would be served well to learn the differences between these two medical approaches to health care. If decades long trends continue into the future patients and homeopathic doctors may be forced to operate outside of the purview of the state.
This is my first installment in what will be an ongoing series on alternative medicine. Years before I had converted to anarchism I learned firsthand that mainstream medicine isn’t all it’s quacked up to be. But while many anarchists are weary of corporate sick-care we are often guilty of not utilizing the best resource possible to diagnose and heal our ailments, the internet. This is likely because we lack confidence in ourselves, trusting instead so-called experts.
