The Why I Ams Archives - Page 2 of 2 - The Libertarian Labyrinth

A. P. Brown, “Why I Am a Non-Resistant” (1890)

June 6, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[two_third padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] WHY I AM A NON-RESISTANT. BY A. P. BROWN. Well, first, because having been at the trouble to be born into this somewhat interesting world I feel inclined to linger in it as long as may be to learn more in regard to its workings, and I have noticed that those who are ready and prone to fight, who believe in fighting and practice it, are more likely not to die of old age than are those who follow after the things that make for peace. There is some risk, to be sure, whichever course […]

Victor Yarros, “Why I, as an Anarchist, Will Not Work with Socialists” (1890)

June 6, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[two_third padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] WHY I, AS AN ANARCHIST, WILL NOT WORK WITH THE SOCIALISTS. BY VICTOR YARROS. I find it exceedingly difficult to comply with the editor’s request for a comparatively brief statement of the reason “Why I, as an Anarchist, will not work with Nationalists, Socialists, and Single-taxers.” I doubt not that the editor realizes fully as well as I do the utter absurdity of the question; and if he has put it and has solicited an answer, it must be because the confusion in the mind of what we love to style “the public” is so […]

Louisa Sarah Bevington, “Why I Am an Expropriationist” (1894)

June 6, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[two_third padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] WHY I AM AN EXPROPRIATIONIST. BY L.S. BEVINGTON. I advocate and I look forward to wholesale expropriation because I do not believe there is any such thing as a right to property, and because I hold that it is disastrous, nay, fatal, to the welfare of all individuals composing the community, to have to regulate their lives and affairs in accordance with a fictitious abstraction which has no warrant and no basis in the natural laws of life. I desire universal expropriation, not merely because the power that property-holding gives to man over man is […]

William Morris, “Why I Am a Communist” (1894)

June 6, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

[two_third padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] WHY I AM A COMMUNIST. BY WILLIAM MORRIS. Objection has been made to the use of the word “Communism” to express fully-developed Socialism, on the ground that it has been used for the Community-Building, which played so great a part in some of the phases of Utopian Socialism, and is still heard of from time to time nowadays. Of Communism in this sense I am not writing now; it may merely be said in passing that such experiments are of their nature non-progressive; at their best they are but another form of the Mediæval monastery, […]

The Why I Ams

June 5, 2018 Shawn P. Wilbur

THE WHY I AMS Twentieth Century Van Buren Denslow, “Why I Am a Protectionist,” Twentieth Century 4 no. 17 (April 24, 1890): 7–8; 4 no. 18 (May 1, 1890): 6–8 William G. Sumner, “Why I Am a Free Trader,” Twentieth Century 4 no. 17 (April 24, 2890): 8–10. William Lloyd Garrison, “Why I Am a Single-Taxer,” Twentieth Century 4 no. 18 (May 1, 1890): 5–6. Laurence Gronlund, “Why I Am a Socialist,” Twentieth Century 4 no. 19 (May 8, 1890): 5–6. Burnette G. Haskell, “Why I Am a Nationalist,” Twentieth Century 4 no. 20 (May 15, 1890): 5–7. John […]

Johann Most, “Why I Am a Communist” (1892)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur

One of the principal features of the development of modern industrial production is the ever-increasing organization of the laboring force and of the means of production. The result is that with less “hands” a continually growing amount of commodities is being produced. From this last is might be concluded that man should be thus enabled to satisfy all his intellectual and physical wants with a decreasing exertion of his physical powers. Yet, no such result is apparent. On the contrary, all progress in the direction of facilitating the process of production has the effect of reducing the number of laborers […]