Stefan Molyneux is a Canadian political pundit and internet celebrity. In 2005, Molyneux began a podcast called Freedomain Radio (FDR) and in 2006 he started a YouTube channel. Today he has a large cult following. As of July 2018 his YouTube channel has 798,445 subscribers and has had 247,260,366 views.
By now many Kiwis will have heard of Stefan Molyneux, thanks to protesters—including Auckland’s mayor Phil Goff, the Auckland Peace Action group, and Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand (FIANZ) president Hazim Arafeh—trying to shut down an event at which Molyneux was booked to speak. At this stage it’s unclear whether or not the event will go ahead as scheduled. What is clear is that these days Molyneux is both full of himself and full of the proverbial.
But Molyneux used to be all right.
Molyneux used to be all right. Now he’s alt-right.
Molyneux used to be a fresh and fervid anarchist. Now he’s lapsed back into full-blown statism.
It’s all very sad, but it’s worth remembering that back in 2010 Molyneux published this wee gem.
The Story of Your Enslavement
This is the story of your enslavement—how it came to be—and how you can finally be free.
I’m not your dad or anything, but it’s worth watching the video presentation or reading the transcript. Even though it’s somewhat offensive to many, including creationists and vegans, and riddled with alternative facts and flawed logic. There’s a discussion of its various shortcomings in the comment section here if that’s what you want to focus on.
Here’s the gist of it anyway.
Human society cannot be rationally understood until it is seen for what it is: a series of farms where human farmers own human livestock.
Some people get confused because governments provide healthcare and water and education and roads, and thus imagine that there is some benevolence at work.
Nothing could be further from the reality.
Farmers provide healthcare and irrigation and training to their livestock.
Some people get confused because we are allowed certain liberties, and thus imagine that our governments protect our freedoms.
But farmers plant their crops a certain distance apart to increase their yields—and will allow certain animals larger stalls or fields if it means they will produce more meat and milk.
In your country, your tax farm, your farmer grants you certain freedoms not because he cares about your liberties, but because he wants to increase his profits.
Are you beginning to see the nature of the cage you were born into?
Molyneux then goes on to describe how the illusion of freedom is maintained.
Keeping the tax livestock securely in the compounds of the ruling classes is a three phase process.
The first is to indoctrinate the young through government “education”.
And so on. There’s nothing particularly original in Molyneux’s claims. For example, the idea that we’re slaves who think we’re free was suggested by Aldous Huxley. It’s pretty much a variation on pānem et circēnsēs (“bread and circuses”) which goes back to the satirical Roman poet Juvenal circa 100 AD.
But is Molyneux right or are we living in a free world? In an important sense it’s a matter of perspective, and a matter of personal preference. Even in an ideal state of affairs—Molyneux’s “truly free and peaceful” society, a society “without political rulers, without human ownership, without the violence of taxation and statism”—people would voluntarily trade some of their absolute freedoms for security, and call the residual freedoms “liberty”. The nature of “the cage you were born into” is one that suits some people, who are relatively more free in virtue of the fact that they have no desire to leave.
What does Molyneux in 2010 tell us about Molyneux’s predicament now?
Molyneux is a free-range slave, the property of Canada’s ruling class. But he seems to have forgotten this. He’s bought back into the illusion that the government is the servant of the people.
Ask not what your slave-owner can do for you—ask what you can do for your slave owner.
Molyneux has reversed this paraphrase of JFK’s dictum.
Ask not what you can do for your slave owner—ask what your slave-owner can do for you.
And what is Molyneux asking? He’s asking his owners’ friends (NZ’s ruling class) to let him cross into and speak in their slave pen, and at the same time asking his owners (Canada’s ruling class) and their friends (Western governments) to keep Muslims out! The irony is rich. Molyneux requires permission to leave Canada and permission to enter New Zealand, and he’s only been given permission at the last minute and he’s only allowed to be here in Aotearoa for 10 days.
Stefan Molyneux will be allowed into the country for 10 days, Immigration Minister Iain Lees-Galloway announced on Friday morning.
Today’s Molyneux is an immigration alarmist. I predict he’ll have about as much success stopping Muslim immigration as climate change alarmists will have stopping anthropogenic global warming. None at all. And this is for the simple reason that setting immigration policies is not up to Molyneux or to any of his fan base. Immigration policies are set, not by human cattle, but by human farmers. And they stand to profit from mass immigration just as much as they do from burning fossil fuels.
