Would a pagan society be Libretarian?

rcunning03

Would the pagan idea of 'do as you wish as long as it harms no one else' mean a pagan society would have small government, a gold standard currency and a lot more civil liberty as long as what you want to do doesn't harm anyone else?

Pagans seem to place a lot of value on being self reliant. Would this mean there would be no enforced government social insurance or welfare. Would it be upto the individual to provide for the own welfare in terms of unemployment insurance, medical bills etc? I think it could work as pagans also place value on helping their communities and those that could afford it would contribute to charity. Those charities would be run by people who geniunely want to help other people instead of beauacrats that viciously protect their own interets and by donating to a private charity there is a better chance more of your money will go towards helping people instead of paying for a beauracy.

Or would the enforced system of social insurance we have now be compatible with pagan beliefs?

Would pagans like to see an inflation free currency backed up by a gold standard?

As gold has suffered from very little or no inflation over the millenia it would be easier to provide for you own welfare because €200 saved 20 years ago would still buy you the same basket of goods today as 20 years ago. We could start saving as soon as we started working and would have alot of money save by retirement and we could save our money in a savings account getting compunded interst each year, instead of having to gamble with our money on the markets to make up the amount we lost from inflation.

Would gold and silver coins being used as money (and paper notes promising to pay a set amount of gold or silver) be appealing to pagans as it is what our ancestors used?

Finally would a pagan society have laws against what you can do with your own body? Would a pagan society force people not to consume substances if they so wished?

The reason I ask is they seem similar philosiphies to me but I would be interesting in hearing what a few pagans would make of the similarities (or lackof)

Cheers

Nevyn

You do know that the term 'pagan' is an umbrella term which a wide range of religions, paths and spiritualness fall under, right?

and that some people are libertarians and some are even right wing racists?

rcunning03 wrote: »

Would the pagan idea of 'do as you wish as long as it harms no one else' mean a pagan society would have small government, a gold standard currency and a lot more civil liberty as long as what you want to do doesn't harm anyone else?

That is not a pagan idea or a 'pagan movement' ideal.
That seems to be a misquote from the book of the law which is a spiritual and magical order founder by Alister Crowely know as the Ordo Templi Orientis or O.T.O.

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.Love is the law, love under will.

While there are some pagans that I now of who are members of O.T.O. they would be in the minority as I know it in Ireland.

OR else it is a misquote from what has been postulated to be one of the Wiccan redes "An harm none, do as you wilt", "an" in that context being an old form of if, also redes are advice and not rules/instructions and again
only a small % of pagans in Ireland are Wiccan initiates.

So the idea that the majority of pagans subscribe to living their live by either of those quotes is one I find baffling.

rcunning03 wrote: »

Pagans seem to place a lot of value on being self reliant.

Really is that personal experience or do you have something to back that up?

rcunning03 wrote: »

Would this mean there would be no enforced government social insurance or welfare. Would it be upto the individual to provide for the own welfare in terms of unemployment insurance, medical bills etc?

I do not personally have an issue with living in a country which as social insurance, I do wish it was managed a lot better mind.

rcunning03 wrote: »

I think it could work as pagans also place value on helping their communities and those that could afford it would contribute to charity.

Again do you have a reference to back that up?
While I am fortunate enough to be able to give some money and time to charity I don't get how or why you seem to think that pagans in general are into doing a lot of charitable work.

rcunning03 wrote: »

Those charities would be run by people who geniunely want to help other people instead of beauacrats that viciously protect their own interets and by donating to a private charity there is a better chance more of your money will go towards helping people instead of paying for a beauracy.

Again I can only personally answer that I do not have a lot of time for charities which absorb a large % of thier donations into administration.

rcunning03 wrote: »

Or would the enforced system of social insurance we have now be compatible with pagan beliefs?

Which set of pagan beliefs?
Heathen, Discordian, modern Druidism, or the carious witchcraft traditions; Wicca, Feri/Anderson, Dianic, Tubal Cain ect.
There are many.

rcunning03 wrote: »

Would pagans like to see an inflation free currency backed up by a gold standard?

As gold has suffered from very little or no inflation over the millenia it would be easier to provide for you own welfare because €200 saved 20 years ago would still buy you the same basket of goods today as 20 years ago. We could start saving as soon as we started working and would have alot of money save by retirement and we could save our money in a savings account getting compunded interst each year, instead of having to gamble with our money on the markets to make up the amount we lost from inflation.

Would gold and silver coins being used as money (and paper notes promising to pay a set amount of gold or silver) be appealing to pagans as it is what our ancestors used?

Have you been into the money exhibition in the Collins Barracks Museum?
You should go if you get a chance you will learn alot about the history of coinage in this country. We never had people wandering about with gold coins.

rcunning03 wrote: »

Finally would a pagan society have laws against what you can do with your own body?

Again that is far to subjective and there many people who are pagan who will hold different view on that topic and given how non specifically it's worded I can't even give a personal stance on it.

rcunning03 wrote: »

Would a pagan society force people not to consume substances if they so wished?

Again what do you mean by substances?

rcunning03 wrote: »

The reason I ask is they seem similar philosiphies to me but I would be interesting in hearing what a few pagans would make of the similarities (or lackof)

Cheers

There are many different philosophies in paganism so it will depend on what a certain pagan or a certain group subscribes to.

rcunning03

How do you do the mini-quotes without quoting everything I tried replying to your points but it just looks messy?

If you tell us how to do that I'll reply to you points it just I haven't been on for ages and I forget how to do that

Nevyn

Glad to remind you of how to do it.
The code is:
[noparse]

text goes here

[/noparse]
[noparse]

poster wrote:

text goes here

[/noparse]

Which will give you:

text goes here

poster wrote:

text goes here

I look forward to reading your replies

rcunning03

Thanks for the reminder

You do know that the term 'pagan' is an umbrella term which a wide range of religions, paths and spiritualness fall under, right?

and that some people are libertarians and some are even right wing racists?

I didn't want to single out one particular pagan belief as I don't really know enough about them. The one I have done some reading and research on is Druidism but I didn't want to single it out cause I can't talk about it with any serious knowledge. So I classified it all as Pagan but I really meant Druidism even though I know wicca is different to druidism. If you could point me towards a free market libertarian form of druidism I'd really appreciate as in my mind they are compatible.

OR else it is a misquote from what has been postulated to be one of the Wiccan redes "An harm none, do as you wilt",

Yep ! I couldn't remember the exact quote just the jist of it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by rcunning03
Pagans seem to place a lot of value on being self reliant.

Really is that personal experience or do you have something to back that up?

That was impression I got from reading Emma Restall Orr 'Living Druidism' and the fact it's a nature based religion and about living off the land and being in harmony with it. Personally I would love to have most of the food I eat grown in my back garden or ideally my farm (if I had one).

Quote:
Originally Posted by rcunning03
Would this mean there would be no enforced government social insurance or welfare. Would it be upto the individual to provide for the own welfare in terms of unemployment insurance, medical bills etc?

I do not personally have an issue with living in a country which as social insurance, I do wish it was managed a lot better mind.

The reason I asked that is if you take being self reliant to it's extreme you would have to provide for your own welfare. I've no real problem with social insurance but what I would like to see is privatised healthcare and education and our social insurance would help people pay for private health and education who can't afford the full cost of private healthcare and education. They have a similar sort of system in some north west european countries and private schools and hospitals are better than public ones.

Also I would have no problem with my prsi being used to help people in finacial difficulty, it saves the hassle of finding a decent charity that isn't a scam and it reduces the need for people to be violent to get money.

What really annoys me is welfare being provided to the banks, developers and speculators and even tax breaks are a form of welfare for the rich. I don't make much money but the money I have to pay for social insurance I want used for people with less than me. I don't want it used so some developer can keep making payments on his Bentley.

I think the market should of been allowed work and the banks should of been allowed fail. We need a banking industry but we don't need any of the irish banks. Some bank that was well run would of bought our banks they would of agreed to write down some of people's mortgages as long as they gaurenteed to pay it back, all the excess property would of being sold at 'firesale' prices or as I like to call it the current market price people are prepared to pay. The excess property would be sold and we could move on. A lot of companies would of went to the wall but the price of paying for welfare and retraining of those people would (I imagine but can't prove) be a lot less than the €57bn we are giving to the richest in this country.

Quote:
Originally Posted by rcunning03
I think it could work as pagans also place value on helping their communities and those that could afford it would contribute to charity.

Again do you have a reference to back that up?
While I am fortunate enough to be able to give some money and time to charity I don't get how or why you seem to think that pagans in general are into doing a lot of charitable work.

Again I really meant druidism and it's the impression I got from reading Emma Restall Orrand the druid websites I looked at. We could all read the exact same book and come away with different impressions and ideas from it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by rcunning03
Would pagans like to see an inflation free currency backed up by a gold standard?

As gold has suffered from very little or no inflation over the millenia it would be easier to provide for you own welfare because €200 saved 20 years ago would still buy you the same basket of goods today as 20 years ago. We could start saving as soon as we started working and would have alot of money save by retirement and we could save our money in a savings account getting compunded interst each year, instead of having to gamble with our money on the markets to make up the amount we lost from inflation.

Would gold and silver coins being used as money (and paper notes promising to pay a set amount of gold or silver) be appealing to pagans as it is what our ancestors used?

Have you been into the money exhibition in the Collins Barracks Museum?
You should go if you get a chance you will learn alot about the history of coinage in this country. We never had people wandering about with gold coins.

Up until the first world war money was backed by a gold standard. A soverign is a quarter ounce of gold and had a face value of £1. An £1 note promised to pay the bearer on demand a £1 soverign coin and could be exchanged for gold. Even today english money still promises to pay the bearer on the demand, the difference is now you don't get gold and it's just a meaningless promise as the paper is money now.

Until 1913 in America a dollar was a one ounce silver coin or 'silver dollar' and a one dollar bank note was a promise to pay a silver dollar and $20 could be exchanged for an ounce of gold. The gold standard had to be abandoned so governments could pay for the two world wars. Until 1971 the US dollar was tied to gold at $35 an ounce and then the gold standard was completely abanded after 1971. When Ireland got our independence our currency had a higher content of silver in our coins so that our money would be as accepted as sterling.
http://www.centralbank.ie/frame_main.asp?pg=ncn_hist.asp&nv=ncn_nav.asp

Also if you go way back we were using gold ring money

Quote:
Originally Posted by rcunning03
Finally would a pagan society have laws against what you can do with your own body?

Again that is far to subjective and there many people who are pagan who will hold different view on that topic and given how non specifically it's worded I can't even give a personal stance on it.


Quote:
Originally Posted by rcunning03
Would a pagan society force people not to consume substances if they so wished?

Again what do you mean by substances?

I mean drugs, hash, heroine, LSD etc I didn't want to say as it might be against board rules. Would a druid society try to force people not to take drugs or would they give them the freedom to abuse/use your body the way you see fit.

All opinions expressed are my opinions unfortunately I don't have the luxury of backing up everything I say cause I'm in work and just don't have the access to the material I would need.

Anyway didn't mean to generalise but I don't really know enough about druidism (espeically when talking to people who do) to say what the beliefs of druidism are and I probably got some of them wrong but it's the impression I got from reading the Living druidism book and also from the few website on druidism I've looked up.

philologos

I think the question that people need to ask themselves is a liberal, permissive society always better than a conservative society with reasonable restrictions.

Fremen

Jakkass wrote: »

I think the question that people need to ask themselves is a liberal, permissive society always better than a conservative society with reasonable restrictions.

Define "better" and define "restrictions" (and "reasonable") and we might have an interesting conversation.

Rcunning, I don't believe a switch to the gold standard would bring as much stability as you think. The price of gold is massively unstable at the moment, an ounce of gold now would buy you a hell of a lot more than an ounce of gold four years ago.

Thaedydal, do you know anything more about Alisdair Crowley or O.T.O? I have reason to believe my academic supervisor is involved (if he isn't involved, he's certainly interested), and I wouldn't mind devising some sort of test.
Writing "Ordo Templi Orientis" on the whiteboard in my office and observing his reaction would be one approach, but I'd rather something more subtle.

Nevyn

Jakkass wrote: »

I think the question that people need to ask themselves is a liberal, permissive society always better than a conservative society with reasonable restrictions.

I belive that would best be a discussion for the humanities forum.

Fremen wrote: »

Thaedydal, do you know anything more about Alisdair Crowley or O.T.O? I have reason to believe my academic supervisor is involved (if he isn't involved, he's certainly interested), and I wouldn't mind devising some sort of test.
Writing "Ordo Templi Orientis" on the whiteboard in my office and observing his reaction would be one approach, but I'd rather something more subtle.

There are plenty of resources on the net and copies of some of thier ritual and the books of Thelma.

As for trying to out a person's religious/spiritual/magical life, esp for idle curiosity or speculation, well it's not something I can condone. I am sure if he wanted to know then he'd speak to you about it.