Rebel Rabbits (RR) is the creator, administrator, and software engineer for Concepts are Bricks.
Self-identifying as a libertarian since he was 17, RR evolved from a hardline, leftwing-hating, capital O-Objectivist into a left-wing market anarchist who strongly values bottom unity. He has watched with disappointment and growing concern as many of his libertarain idols (e.g., Rand, Molyneux, Tucker) fell from ideological grace, and toxic fringe elements, such as the alt-right and misogynistic Men’s Rights Activists (MRAs), increasingly enter libertarian spaces. This slide toward right wing radicalization in the libertarian community, along with the formative experiences described below, led him to believe in the value of and need for Concepts are Bricks.
RR studied political science at the University of Maryland, where, in his senior year, he became the president of the College Park Students for Liberty. At the time, RR considered himself a post-objectivist. Though he largely agreed with Ayn Rand on the essential role of Capitalism in a free society, the conclusion he drew from libertarian philosophy was that anarchy, not minarchy, was the only political system truly congruent with the objectivist non-aggression principle.
RR felt that the state was the root cause of humanity’s significant social problems, and that by striking at the root of the state, bigotry in all its forms would be effectively toothless. Without the state, he thought, there’d be no slavery, colonialism, imperialism, or state-enforced injustice of any kind. In a free society, the market— not police or politicians— would punish the irrational behavior of bigots. Two incidents that happened during senior year forced RR to challenge his mindset.
The first happened when RR brought two women— one of whom was the future Mrs. RR— to a weekly Students for Liberty meeting. This had not happened since the year before, when the club experienced increased interest during Ron Paul’s presidential bid.
You would think this would have been a big deal, but what followed surprised RR. The future Mrs. RR later told RR that she and her friend had not enjoyed the meeting, so much so that her friend decided to not ever return. When the women— who were libertarian-leaning and sympathetic to the club’s ethos— asked questions or presented arguments, some of the team members treated them with condescension, paternalism, or outright dismissal.
This surprised RR; Students for Liberty was familiar with strong disagreement. The group was evenly divided between anarchists and minarchists, and while disagreement was passionate, it had always been respectful. Club members didn’t treat each other with condescension or disrespect before, even during heated debates. But when these women challenged their ideas, they acted differently.
The second incident happened several months later during the summer. RR, future Mrs. RR, and two friends drove to Philadelphia for July 4th to see Larkin Rose make a speech and to see Molyneux debate Michael Badnarik on Anarchism vs Minarchism. In Independence National Historical Park, our group walked the grounds speaking to the occasional audience member. We came across a character in a costume who called himself “Economic Jesus”. He explained his costume was “an economic producer who was being burdened by socialists and regulations to save his fellow men”. After this explanation, he turns to future Mrs. RR, the only woman in our group, and asks her, “How does it feel to be responsible for all the violence in the world?” “Excuse me?”, she replied. “Yes, because women are primarily responsible for raising kids and for the abuse that kids suffer… which later results in violence in society.” This was the second time in a matter of months, in a libertarian space, where individuals who supposedly valued individualism and rebuked the collectivism of bigotry, displayed unconscious... or very conscious, prejudice against a person because of that person’s gender.
Fast forward a year or so, RR and future Mrs. RR were living in Texas and had co-founded an Alliance of the Libertarian Left (ALL) chapter in Austin. Neither identified as left libertarians, but they wanted to form a space that was inclusive both towards all their liberty-minded friends, be they market-anarchists, agorists, or mutualists. The group sponsored, marketed, and attended events at two radical bookstores: Brave New Books (BNB)—a wet dream for any right libertarian, conspiracy theorist, or survivalist— and Monkey Wrench Books, which catered to the radical left. Events at BNB showcased social anarchist scott crow, discussed agorism, and housed a “Alliance of Libertarian Left” bookshelf for our materials. Monkey Wrench held talks by Charles Johnson on free market anarchism. It was a big tent and it opened RR’s eyes to concepts that would later be collectively referred to as bottom unity.
The experience of hosting events also highlighted the need for libertarian spaces to embrace explicit anti-bigotry to support this big tent we created. Women, LGBT, minorities, and anti-authoritarian leftists were all welcome and could expect the people of the ALL chapter to intervene on their behalf if any person questioned their time preference, dual loyalty, or habitually shouted over them. That didn’t happen often, but when it did, chapter leaders promptly booted the offenders from the group and its social events. Had ALL not taken a stance against bigotry and expelled its toxic members, the club would have lost valuable contributors, whose love of liberty prompted them to continually ask, “How else can we increase freedom for the benefit of all people?” Without those contributors, the tent would not have been big, and it would not have truly embodied the concept of “freedom for me and freedom for thee.” The diversity the group fostered— both of identity and ideas— helped make the environment fun, friendly, and robust.
To oversimplify the remaining years and catch our story up to present day, there are two periods of time that stuck out: the MRA movement and Trump. The first showed that there were plenty in libertarian spaces who were able to hold ideals antithetical to the grounds of libertarianism that could act as blind spots that impacted the group’s success of marketing the libertarian movement. The second showed that many libertarians, if they ever were such a thing, arrived at that conclusion via antithetical grounds altogether and seeked to transform it into something altogether different.
Around 2012-2013, RR would never have made the argument that zero valid concerns came out of the MRA movement. However, RR would strongly argue, in his opinion, the effects of the MRA movement in general and its impact on libertarian spaces specifically, was orders of magnitude more damaging than enlightening. RR noticed it was increasingly frequent to experience a person in libertarian spaces, virtual or physical, or a celebritarian, who made collectivistic comments tying women as individuals to their group. There was a renewed interest in pick-up artists (PUA). Completely sexist blogs, such as Return of Kings, were making the rounds. For the first time RR could recall, a demographic group was identified as a threat, to whatever degree, to the success of a libertarian society.
Fast forward to mid 2015 and beyond and we get the alt-right and Trump. RR was shocked to see the number of social media acquaintances who previously rejected the 2012 Ron Paul campaign because “it wasn’t consistent enough with anarcho-capitalism” now wearing MAGA hats. Never before in RR’s experience was immigration a contentious issue among libertarians. Never before in libertarian spaces were folks admonishing the work of “race realists”. Former celebritarians, such as Molynuex, Southern, and Cantwell, came out as self-identified white nationalists or white supremacists. Radical libertarian think tanks, such as the Mises Institute, suggested marketing “blood and soil” or risk irrelevance. Libertarian media sites, such as Lew Rockwell [dot] com and the Ron Paul newsletters peddled xenophobic alarmism that looked more familiar on InfoWars. To RR’s dismay, it seemed that a not insignificant minority of the libertarian movement was defaulting to illiberal right wing populism, if not outright fascism.
From the time RR was a teenager, he romanticized libertarianism. You could even say he fell in love with it. All these years later, he still feels that way. He truly cares about the success of the libertarian movement and is so bold as to hope he might still be alive to see the realization of a robust libertarian society. When RR thinks back to what is most conducive to a successful movement, which he believes must be a large tent to some degree. RR thinks about what factors help market libertarianism to everyone (because libertarianism is for everyone). RR has the humility to acknowledge that he doesn’t have all the answers and shouldn’t be the central planner of the movement. That being said, RR is sure that for the libertarian movement to be successful, it must be a movement dedicated to the liberation of everyone. To this end, RR has created a platform to help guard the libertarian movement against bigotry and authoritarian entryism (from either the left or right), which are both antithetical to the core tenets of libertarianism: individualism and freedom for all.