A Paradigm Shift is Never Simple

We, Paul and Kitty Antonik Wakfer, recognize the fact that the Self-Sovereign Individual Project represents a major paradigm shift - a significant change in fundamental thinking. This requires time to truly understand the principles involved and change mental habits and emotional attachments that have been in use for years - not a simple task even when there is a strong desire to adopt a more correct and fruitful approach. After over 5 years of almost daily intensive work on these ideas, there are still times when one or both of us must reexamine an initial reaction to a situation for its validity with respect to the principles (derived from the facts of human nature and reality) that are detailed in the Theory of Social Meta-Needs and the Natural Social Contract.

Freedom Focus on Interactions

The articles in this section are written by Kitty Antonik Wakfer, and where indicated by Paul Antonik Wakfer and others, with a focus on the underlying principles of this Project in situations of common interpersonal activities. It is the purpose of these pieces to demonstrate better ways of viewing interactions, and hence of actually interacting in the future, than is the practice in current societies, being at best a mix of free-market and growing government intervention as they are. As they are published here, many of these articles are promoted by links elsewhere (particularly Rational Review through their news digest, RRND) and most of them are also announced on the Yahoo group MoreLife where ensuing discussion sometimes takes place.

• Harm - Responsibility and Restitution. Aspects of harm often disregarded in society
• MoreLife Yahoo Discussion Thread for "Harm - Responsibility and Restitution"
• Government Caused Stagnation - Parallel in Anti-Aging with Human Flight. Thoughts on the 100th anniversary of the Wright Brothers' achievement of powered controlled sustained flight
• Anonymity - Hazard, Not Protection; Limitation, not Enhancement. And the type of information valuable to learn and provide
• Personal Characteristics as Market Commodities. A self-ordered society based on the principles of the Social Meta-Needs theory requires that its participants be just as aware of the personal characteristics of individuals as they are about the attributes of any other market product or service. (Jointly written by Kitty and Paul.) Comment section added 2/27/12
• Social Preferencing - Evaluation and Choice of Association; A Method for Influence. Even in the current statist societies, an individual can do far more to promote and affect the reduction of harmful government actions than has been previously realized by most.
• Communication Fluidity and the Obstacle of Privacy Claims. Those who claim that emails and other forms of communication are by default private, unless permission has been granted to use them, are denying certain basic facts of reality.
• Harm Resulting from Boredom; Causes and Solutions. "We were bored" is the reason given by local teenagers for vandalizing a restaurant; a deeper look is provided at what this really means and how to eliminate it as a reason for destructive actions.
• Replacing Those in Power is not "The" Answer. Increasing numbers of voices (verbal and in print) are calling for the removal or resignation of George W Bush as the list of his (and associates') errors in judgment become apparent. But few if any address the real causes for the problems or suggest any fundamental solution.
• Improved Effectivity Prescription for Those Against War. Members of the military who freely acknowledge the damage they have done (and in some cases still are doing) as enforcers of government-directed harm, or in direct support of those enforcers, can be most effective in their messages to others towards their objective of stopping war (the one in Iraq being the most currently flagrant) if they are no longer employed by government.
• Working Within or Violence Against The System - An Alternative. Many libertarian writers present their readers with the alternatives of trying to change the government from within or using violence against it, albeit maybe not quite yet for the latter. Very few have presented a non-violent alternative to these, both of which are doomed to either fail or lead back to the same or an even worse condition, and none have presented a non-violent alternative to these which is based on sound principles, practical reasoning and can be used right now by those who understand and want it and are responsible enough to live it.
• Government Distortion vs. Market Realism in Space - or - Is the GPS Worth It? Who Knows? The US government initiated, controlled, financed (with taxes of course) space service program - Global Positioning System - is contrasted with the Iridium communications system using Kitty's insider information, obtained from having been the mechanical engineering task leader for a portion of the GPS program, and her analysis, learned later from studying the problems with government coercion and the values of liberty.
• The Beginning of a Start? Maybe. The public debates over the first US military officer, Army First Lt. Ehren Watada, to refuse deployment to Iraq, based on that action's illegality could begin the start towards the decline of government.
• More Than Reflection. Simply remembering what took place on September 11, 2001 is insufficient. Understanding the underlying reasons for the tragedy and comprehending a fundamental lasting solution require more, but are within the capabilities of anyone truly desirous of a society of individuals interacting to mutual benefit.
• Return To The Constitution??! Merely returning the US government to one of a strict Constitutional interpretation will not eliminate the many and serious existing problems in the US. The flaws in that document, revered though it rightly can be considered for its place in history, make it the cause of many of those problems and incapable of providing a basis for a stable ordered society of maximally free and happy individuals. (This essay was first published on strike-the-root.com in June 2003. It is now, in November 2006, placed here after realizing that STR owner, Rob Moody, {in addition to removing all links to me and Paul and our websites in the author descriptions of our essays there after a dispute I had with him - MoreLife message for more detail} removed all links to SelfSIP documents cited within this essay itself.)
• Beyond Anger and Anguish. If liberty-oriented websites and columns want to have a lasting long-range positive effect, they need to do more than simply report on or even provide commentary (rant) about current atrocities by governments. Much benefit would be reaped by readers and writers alike if the website and commentary contents included the intellectual ammunition to determine the essential fallacies underlying the current and potential new events. (Written in June 2003, submitted to strike-the-root.com but never published and only recently rediscovered.)
• Incremental Approach - A Better Method for Effecting Change. Accepting paradigm shifting ideas may require an initial approach consisting of small steps, something Kitty did not keep in mind in September 2005 when she communicated with her nephew about his position as a US Air Force pilot.
• The Incompleteness of Free Market Economic Arguments; as illustrated by "How to Bureaucratize the Corporate World". Paul Wakfer was prompted to write a lengthy comment after reading one of the daily articles at Mises.org, which Kitty gets as a regular email every day and this time sent him the link. While the original article is very good in its defense of the free market (which doesn't actually exist), it misses some essential points.
• Government Created Tragedies - An Inevitability of the System. Tragedy - "an unfortunate, sad, or discouraging occurrence or situation", per the dictionary, but even more so when it is the result of government.
• Health Care Provision Responsibility and Social Preferencing - A Personal Example. Here's Paul's and my response to an outrageous health care charge and its wider implications. We are two people who work at staying in excellent health and reserve assets for emergencies, rather than pay insurance premiums.
• Tax/Regulation Protests are Not Enough: Relationship of Self-Responsibility and Social Order. Numerous Internet news sources and commentaries have carried an increased number of reports for many months [2008/2009] about various group in-person protests and email/petition actions in the US (and elsewhere) in regard to high government taxes and/or various regulations. I contend that public complaining and even protesting in public is of little real meaning unless those protesting withdraw their sanction/approval from and usage of the things that government does, all paid for by taxes or from borrowed money with principal and interest then repaid from taxes.
• Self-Responsibility - The Cure for Healthcare 'Crisis' and More. The recently passed legislation (Obamacare) requiring all citizens to purchase government approved health "insurance" (actually prepaid health services) is the latest in a very long progression from individual self-responsibility for all aspects of one's personal life to government mandated and/or provided life-long "protection" and "maintenance".
• WikiLeaks: What can one person do to help?. Signing petitions is one way. But getting support money to WikiLeaks has become very awkward for those able to donate only small amounts. PayPal, MasterCard and Visa all appear to be currying favor with the US government, if not actually kowtowing to direct political pressure, by agreeing that WikiLeaks is engaged in "illegal" activities thereby justifying their removal of services. Here is a plan to circumvent this artificial obstacle. Updated 7/21/11
• Libertarians Need less Strategy -- and more Principle! Paul examines the illogical writing and the lack of principle displayed by several prominent libertarian writers in regard to support measures for WikiLeaks; and presents a reality based, unifying approach to decision making.
• Are Principles Unaffordable? "We can't afford to do that", was the answer Kitty received from one online editor when she suggested that his website use alternatives to PayPal, MasterCard and Visa because of their harmful actions towards WikiLeaks, which took place without those corporations being legally compelled to act as they did. She sets out to demonstrate that this editor and others like him are wrong, showing the field of existing and promising alternatives. Updated 7/22/11
• How Real Estate Will Work in the Freeman Society. Alton Lindsay Jr provides a brief but clear explanation of how Real Estate will be established and exchanged in a society based on the principles of Social Meta-Needs.
• Abandoning a Fundamental Principle of Liberty to Justify Mortgage Default. Kitty exposes the philosophical errors in noted libertarian writer and Mises Institute President Doug French's defense of mortgage default on a house that has lost market value. New 7/21/11
• Just Another State In The Making? Alton Lindsay Jr points out some shortcomings of non-statists' replacements for government compared to a society based on the principles of Social Meta-Needs. New 7/22/11
• Voting - Now and For a New Social System? Kitty responds to several questions put on her Facebook Wall regarding political voting, boycotting it and its use to bring about a new system. Updated 2/27/12
• Social Networks - Freedom Enhancers or Internet Ghettos? Kitty and Paul look at the practice of self-isolation within social network niches and its consequences for moving from the current top-down rules enforced society to one based on the principles of Social Meta-Needs. New 2/27/12

Comments, Questions
& Suggestions

All constructive comments to the articles above are welcomed at the Yahoo group MoreLife. Readers are also requested to post suggestions concerning other types of human interactions including their own interpretation of how situations would be affected by or resolved under the principles of the Theory of Social Meta-Needs and the Natural Social Contract. Understanding concepts is only certain when one has the ability to explain them to others so that they too understand; and writing down one's thoughts is an excellent way to examine them and fully understand them.
We, Kitty and Paul, learn also in further explaining - and, when necessary, modifying - what we have written on the basis and implementation of the Self-Sovereign Individual Project. Whether or not the reader chooses to agree on the correctness of our ideas expressed in the dialogues of this section is up to hir, but that choice may reveal much about hir willingness to abandon the old and inadequate yet comfortable, for the new and correct yet often radically different.