Disorganized thoughts for the end of the year

This is going to be kind of a messy blog post. The end of the year is coming, and that week has been pretty busy and different due to the fact that I was off of work and that it was the week of my wife and I's wedding anniversary (the two being related since I took the week off because of the anniversary).

 So, for our big day, on Tuesday, we decided we would go to England. It was Dixie's first time there (due to struggles with the French administration to get her "Titre de séjour" delaying her first crossing of the Channel). We had a wonderful English breakfast in Dover after crossing in a car-ferry. Driving on the "wrong" side of the road was a real experience (not saying more about it...).



We then took the road to Leeds Castle in Maidstone. We arrived in a deep fog that cleared out toward the end of our visit. The gardens and the atmosphere there were really enjoyable. Being a big kid, I ended the visit with a life-size maze.

We finished with a long walk and shopping in Canterbury. We stopped in a tearoom wondering how to end our stay in the city where we met an older couple. The lady was from New Zealand and and the man from Boston. They suggested us a few places to go and see and when the man had to leave, the woman stayed and entertained Dixie with English conversation.







Overall, we had a perfect stay in great landscape and cities and I think our  two-year anniversary was a success.

The rest of the week was filled with paperwork (health insurance), reading a lot (I finished the first book of the Hunger Games trilogy, while still reading A Clash of Kings and La Révolution des Fourmis) and Dixie had a Christmas photoshoot. You can check some of the amazing photos out at this address. You can also visit her website. It's worth having a look at it.

To finish on a sports note, Liverpool annihilated Tottenham and Lens won its first game away in more than three months, so that was a good weekend. Also, I had a physical test on Saturday (3200 meters, switching between 150 meters at fairly high speed in 30 seconds followed by very slow pace of 50 meters in 45 seconds). I did that test on a 400 meters track, but it was very slippery and I slid at the end of my third lap. I'll have another try in January. I also reffed a women's soccer game today, and Dixie said these women would beat up most of my teammates if we were playing against them. I can't say I disagree much.

Anyway, that was my rambling for the day. The three photos at the beginning are of course taken by my beautiful, and I incite you once more to go check out her website and facebook page.

I love you, Dixie! Happy two-year anniversary!

Why I am a libertarian

I have not always called myself a libertarian. To be honest, a few years back I didn't even know the word. I have always felt a strong admiration for the concept of freedom.

I've been raised in a far from wealthy family, who struggled every month to make ends meet. Historically, the whole of my family has also always leaned to the left side of politics, sometimes very left. In certain ways, I follow them. In many others I don't. Libertarianism is neither left nor right.

I had preconceived beliefs that led me to doubt the fact that freedom could be the most efficient response to some problems in the world. Over the years, after hours and hours of reading, studying, questioning, I am deeply convinced of the efficiency of liberty.

In addition to that, on a philosophical note, I believe freedom to be the absolute highest moral value to fight for in the world. I'm now going to list three illustrative examples that are at the core of my libertarianism, among tens of others that I might expose in another post someday.

1. Freedom of Speech

Strange it is that men should admit the validity of the arguments for free speech but object to their being "pushed to an extreme", not seeing that unless the reasons are good for an extreme case, they are not good for any case.

 John Stuart Mill

I don't know anyone who would say that Freedom of Speech is a bad thing. But I've heard and seen so many times comments like "Of course freedom of speech is important, but hateful Nazi websites should be shut down". If Freedom of Speech is not complete and unconditional, then it doesn't exist.

If you only advocate Freedom of Speech for the opinions that you support, you don't advocate it at all. I despise Nazi people as much as anyone ever could (in addition to having awful racial beliefs, they are huge defenders of an all powerful state), but I would never censor anything such a person would have to say by law. That doesn't mean that I endorse their beliefs. If an opinion of that type were to be published on any post of my blog in the comment section, I would delete it. I don't want to relay these comments on my blog. And that is in perfect agreement with Freedom of Speech. This is my blog. If I decide I don't want to see something appear on it, it's my right to delete it. I don't want to be associated with it. If that same person creates their own blog to publish these concepts though, I would have nothing to say.

2. No laws can abolish a contract between consenting adults

The whole duty of government is to prevent crime and to preserve contracts.

Lord Melbourne

The key word in that quote is "whole". Government has no other duties than these two.

Nowadays, politics are trying to manage everyone's life. The main argument for that is usually to "protect" people. Most of the time though, it's to protect them from themselves. It is NOT any government's job. There's so many examples of that type. Most of them seem very good at first sight. Let's take minimum wages laws: higher wages obviously lead to people with a better financial situation. If the wages are high because of contracts agreed on both parts, that's exactly what it means. Sadly, if wages are raised by law only, there come the multiple drawbacks.

First, a legal minimum wage means that all the activities that are worth less than the foregoing wage will simply disappear. Out of the legal setting, that is. Moonlighting will expand instead. People who have no skills that are worth the legal wage still need the money. Second, an increase in a minimum wage by law that doesn't reflect in an increase in productivity only leads to one thing: inflation. The employer that needs to legally increase wages with no increase in productivity will reverberate his higher costs on his prices. Conclusion: some people (the less skilled) can't find a legal job anymore, minimum wage workers are better paid, but inflation made overall prices increase.

3. Still protecting you from yourself : Drugs

If the government can’t keep drugs away from inmates who are locked in steel cages, surrounded by barbed wire, watched by armed guards, drug-tested, strip-searched, X-rayed, and videotaped – how can it possibly stop the flow of drugs to an entire nation?

Ron Crickenberger

This quote only shows the utterly inefficiency of the War on Drugs. That's the utilitarian argument for the legalization of drugs. Personally, I think drug should be legalize even if the War on Drugs was efficient.

I don't do drugs. Never have, never will. Personal choice, not because it's illegal. If drugs (and I mean all drugs) were legalized, I still wouldn't take it. And I'm sure that most people are the same way. But even if some did... What's wrong with that? You can morally disapprove all you want, a drug user only harms himself. It's his choice. He's responsible for that choice. If someday, he harms someone else, either on drugs or not, he'll be responsible for it. How many people are in prison and have never harmed anyone else but themselves?

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These are just a few small examples of what I believe in and why I define myself as a libertarian. I am open to discussion. The comment section is there for you.