Richard Metzger's contribution to RAW Week at BOING BOING has a passage on Robert Anton Wilson's political philosophy:
"There's some confusion about what his political philosophy was like. Wilson is always claimed by the Libertarians because he was against people being arrested for victimless crimes, but the Libertarians won't tell you that RAW also was a strong proponent of the "basic income guarantee" which would make him more of a Socialist than Libertarian, of course, but really he was neither. He wasn't deluded by any political system is perhaps the best way to put it)."
It's true that Wilson favored a basic income guarantee, and later in life he also expressed support for government provided health care for all, something Metzger could have cited to help prove his case. And yes, he broke with mainstream libertarians in certain ways. (See the long interview with New Libertarian Notes, which goes into considerable detail on certain points.)
Still, it feels like a stretch to suggest there's something wrong with libertarians claiming RAW, or to say it's only because "he was against people being arrested for victimless crimes."
Explaining his vote for John Anderson in 1980, Wilson said, "Ideologically, of course, I should have voted for Ed Clark, the Libertarian Party candidate; but I am not that kind of Libertarian, really; I don't hate poor people."
"Ideologically, of course ... " The ILLUMINATUS! trilogy is filled with pages and pages of libertarian and anarchist propaganda. (Simon Moon, one of the main characters, is a left anarchist, but Hagbard Celine, arguably the most important viewpoint character, is a straightforward libertarian).
Wilson wrote many columns for New Libertarian Notes. He was a celebrity within the libertarian movement. When he ran for governor of California, his Guns & Dope Party platform was straightforwardly libertarian (excepting the surrealistic ostriches). For example, the platform called for voluntary taxation, as well as full gun and drug rights. He sometimes referred to himself as a "libertarian" in his writings.
I don't object if a progressive such as Metzger wants to claim RAW, but libertarians have as much right to him as anyone.
Footnote: This seems like a convenient time to recommend Metzger's excellent Dangerous Minds blog. The New Yorker just gave the blog a nice writeup.
6 comments:
Weird: I talked with a friend earlier tonight about RAW as a type of libertarian. I think you're right: they can claim him. The pagans, Forteans, postmodernists, part of the Immortality movement, post-Crowley magickians, Discordians, Subgenii, the General Semanticists, and Illuminati have claimed him, too. Among others.
I think RAW might say there's plenty to go around?
I would think so, too. He had a wide range of interests, and worked hard on many of them. Aside from the actual quality of the work, I think that accounts for much of his staying power. Many folks have a reason to be interested in him.
"I am not that kind of Libertarian, really; I don't hate poor people."
I think that is a huge difference between RAW and the kind of libertarianism promoted by Ron Paul etc.
that along with the "the left worry about big business having too much power, right think government have too much power. both are right". quote.
i can dig the whole libertarian economic philosophy and then Ron Paul etc start coming out with crazy shit about jesus and the gays and abortion and climate change doesn't exist.
sorry, i work in science, you talk nonsense about evolution and man-made climate change not existing and i just can't take you seriously. (as a complete tangent, i've always wondered about RAW and the 'evil' medical profession - you know, his whole Sister Whatsherface Polio cure thing. maybe he was right, maybe he was wrong about that cure but thanks to the bad doctors people of my generation have to google what the fuck Polio was because it doesn't exist in the west anymore).
i've slightly distracted myself there. apologies. my other thought with RAW and libertarianism is his idea that free trade is only achievable between equals.
Robert Anton Wilson had kind words for several political philosophies, from social credit to anarcho-capitalism to Scandinavian social democracy. But he usually ranked mutualism as his favorite, and mutualism is a form of libertarianism. FWIW, in the book intro where he endorses national health insurance he also suggests that the program might not be necessary in a mutualist economy.
As for endorsing a guaranteed income: If that's enough to make you a socialist, then the socialist army includes Milton Friedman.
I have in my notes pp.89-90 of Hayek's Road to Serfdom:
"[...] the security of a minimum income" or the "certainty of a given minimum of subsistence for all" should be "provided for all outside of and supplementary to the market system."
That's HAYEK, teabaggers.
In the Schrodinger's Cat trilogy RAW had a group of anarchists who went by the name POE who plant nukes in "the enemies of the people" and the very first thing on that list is "multinational corporations." The next is large banks and the third is government buildings.
They give the US president a choice: either he confiscate all fortunes above one million dollars and re-distribute it to the poor, redirect all money going to police and military to schools and hospitals in poor neighborhoods, and (in true RAW style) replace Washington on the dollar bill with Mickey Mouse to "forever remind people of the idiocy of worshipping money." And POE nukes Wall Street to show they aren't messing around. They also say if the government - instead of ceding to their demands - and tries to arrest people instead - will set off all the remaining nukes.
It's a novel using quantum physics with variables to tell a tale. In one universe, the president rounds up all LEFT WING radicals instead of ceding to the demands. And America is turned into a radioactive wasteland.
In the other universe, in which the novel is able to continue, it shows people freed from economic wage slavery and how technological advances and inventions slowly turn the world into something akin to Star Trek or Jacque Fresco's Venus Project and his resource-based economy.
While RAW's criticisms of authoritarian communist states are spot on, he would be revolted by todays so-called libertarian orgs like Turning Point USA, PragerU, and Liberty Hangout (who recently just went mask-off fash and apologized for calling themselves libertarians LOL)
RAW was not a socialist, and libertarian principles such as the NAP and their ideas on the use of force are good ideas, but libertarians who say that the NAP and the non-use of force can be used to uphold capitalism are a special kind of special because private property laws can only be reinforced by a police state and monopolies can only be maintained by government fiat.
So I am pretty sure if RAW were alive to day he would probably agree a lot more with the Bernie Sanders of the world than the Jo Jorgensens of the world.
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