Dave Smith, as representative of the movement. Plus, a Thought Experiment

The White PillBox

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Dave Smith, as representative of the movement. Plus, a Thought Experiment

Our messengers are mostly conventional, downplaying anarchism. Is it because a free society seems so far off? We do an interesting thought experiment.

Mark Maresca

Jul 31, 2025

Transcript

Click here for the video link on YouTube

In this episode we start off with a look at our 2 types of libertarian messengers.

Principled messengers keep the moral flame alive; petty political details are irrelevant.

Conventional messengers focus on dealing with contemporary statist policies. It’s statism on statism’s terms. At heart they are anti-state, but downplay their anti-statism views.

I discuss Dave Smith, one of our most prominent and talented liberty advocates. He serves as an ideal representation of this aspect of the conventional messaging style. Identifying as anarchist, but not mentioning it often.

But he also represents both types, in this way: he assumes a free society is far, far down the road.

I displayed this simple graph, to represent how major social changes can happen quickly…

Things go along for what seems to be forever, with no change (for example, slavery, across human history). That’s the horizontal part of the line. Then a transition period happens, an inflection point in the curve, where things change quickly. After that, the original conditions are flipped (again using slavery as an example, slavery is no longer condoned). Now the curve takes the opposite direction, into the extended future. The stable conditions (before and after) take up most of history. But the inflection period…the transition…covers a fairly short time.

I use this to illustrate the pattern for what is likely to be the transition to a free society.

With that as a backdrop, we then engage in a thought experiment. Suppose you could see 15-20 years ahead. Suppose it shows clear, unmistakable signs that the myth of authority is eroding. The debate is over, as to when we’ll know the state’s days are numbered…we’ve started the inflection point. With that fore-knowledge, we ask some interesting questions.

Get ready for an intriguing episode!

Some links to material we covered in this episode:

The Remnant

Episode 23 of my series, discussing conventional vs. principled messaging

Episode 20 of my series, discussing the likelihood of the transition to a free society playing out over the next several generations

My full, free 23-part Myth of Authority Masterclass

Since some may be new to libertarian perspectives, here is a short list of links you may find helpful. I’ve classified them based on the different ways people ponder issues:

Want to know how important things would get done without government?