@thesotiris 20 July 2025 more from that month

Freedom Is Inseparable From Philosophy

Philosophy is about questioning — formulating questions even when we know they’re unanswerable. Since all forms of threat-based government require an unquestionable obedience to arbitrary state “authority”, a philosopher finds himself at odds with the ‘unquestionable’ part of this ghastly affair. The state cannot exist if enough people ponder the philosophical questions: “Says who?” or “Why do I have to?” https://sotiris.substack.com/p/the-philosophical-query You can argue utilitarian trolley problems and all kinds of mental gymnastics to support the notion of the violently imposed “state”. You can rationalise your state-biased conviction that the state’s supposedly “benevolent” mission is to protect us from threats, at any cost or threat… all except the daily threats we receive from it, lest we grant it our absolute obedience, to the point of killing and dying in a trench far away from home for the state’s “protection”. There can be no self-respecting philosopher who supports statism. **The whole exercise of philosophy is questioning**. **Philosophy is there to question what is deemed unquestionable**. And if you question the supposed righteousness or usefulness of the state, then you revert to the default state (no pun intended) of nature: statelessness. You may also question statelessness, but here’s the crucial difference: statelessness works whether you question it or not. The default condition of things does not require you to be unquestioning. You can question gravity, but it still pulls you. You can question **the golden calf of the state**, though, and the idol ceases to exist, simply because its whole “existence” rests on self-delusion. Arbitrary threat-based systems of control, like government or military ranks, exist only if you fall for the bluff of authority. https://sotiris.substack.com/p/authority-is-a-bluff And **this is what the state is: a golden calf, a false god, a trauma-induced fantasy**. The state relies on the unquestionable obedience of a critical mass of people of a given population. If enough people delude themselves that the imaginary deity of “the state” is a separate entity from the thugs who manage it, then this entity begins to “exist” in the minds and actions of people. If we all pretend that the false god of government exists, in practical terms, it does “exist”: we act as if it loves us, as if it knows best, as if it’s the arbiter of morality, as if it has divine authority to threaten and punish us, and as if we owe it a damn. But the state is mere mass fantasy, or mass delusion, like any other religious cult. Those who question the state get punished, lest they spread their defiance to others, which would eventually lead to **the collapse of the government’s house of cards**. Statelessness doesn’t mind being questioned. In statelessness, those who prefer to be ruled can create **artificial power structures** for themselves and leave the rest of us in peace. Isn’t this what dominatrices and BDSM are about — satisfying the twisted needs of those who enjoy being submitted and humiliated? If we offered free sadomasochism services to pathological state lovers, perhaps they’d satiate their kinky need for subservience, and thus help them give up their drive to be dominated by corrupt politicians, the latter of which puts us all in the same boat unwillingly. You cannot philosophise without arguing against the deluded need for government. You cannot call yourself a philosopher if your inclination is not the default state of freedom over the contrived, arbitrary notion of perceived “authority” — an “authority” magically imbued into random individuals after some mumbo-jumbo paper ceremony. And if you are a true philosopher, you’d question this also.