Fear Is Not Understanding

Fear Is Not Understanding "The cause of liberty is hopeless," say some, "unless we reach people's pocketbooks. Anything short of an ap peal to their selfish interests is a waste of time. Show them that their jobs, their homes, their businesses, the educa tion of their children, are at stake. There is no other manner of engaging their efforts for liberty." While these warnings, in my opinion, are justified, I rate an appeal to them very low as a means of generating interest and stimulating a spirit of inquiry. Fear in the heart does not initiate understanding in the mind. Fear tends to panic; if strong enough, to paralyze. While it is true that all of us are ultimately motivated by self-interest, it is not true that self-interest is always appraised in the narrow terms of immediate, seemingly temporary gain. Such interpretation is unenlightened in terpretation. The idea that people who cannot "see beyond the end of their noses" can be leaders in libertarian thought is expecting too much. These people have no role in this intellectual contest except as followers. This is not said disparagingly, because most of us are followers in most aspects of life; we are leaders only rarely.

39 Aptitudes vary. Only a few are educable in art. The same can be said for music, agronomy, cooking, medicine, the several crafts. It can also be said for social science and political philosophy. No one person knows in whom these aptitudes exist. Most individuals are even unaware of their own educability as relating to untried, unexplored fields. It is educability, an aptitude for understanding liberty, that enables one to explain it and thus to have a value in this contest with violence. This is the trait in ourselves to be stimulated and encouraged. It is useless to expect that our fears will motivate us to a better understanding. * In short, the persons who count in this affair are those who are moved by a force of a higher order, those who take their positions in accordance with a sense of right and wrong, and those who give profound attention to determin ing right from wrong. Such persons conceive their self interest to be best served by this higher determination.