I'll Have A Sopapilla With That SOPA

My apologies for getting political this early in the game but I am afraid today's events have inspired this. Check here if you need an explanation. This is nothing new really; just people in shock (SHOCK I tell you) that a small group of people they have given the right to use violence to is now threatening to use said violence in a way some people do not approve of.

People thought copyright was a rational concept AND they think complex social problems need to be solved by the use of violence. Then people get upset when these two come together in the form of SOPA. Don't get me wrong: this is indeed a disgusting, horrible thing. But why so shocked? I think what is shocking is that people hold two contradictory thoughts at the same time:

1. "I believe that a small group of people should have the power to use violence."
2. "I, as a set of people not in the above group, have the power to control them."

So now we have all this insanity of protesting. Sites like Wikipedia are blacking out their entire pages as if some politician is going to shit himself into despair. Most people who are protesting SOPA, from what I can tell, have no problem with the government itself; they would rather the government go back to doing other things like putting poor blacks and Mexicans in jail for possessing a piece of vegetation in their pocket, or harassing gay people who want to get married. "But by golly don't you mess with us hipsters who want to download songs or use Wikipedia!" 

Well, if you accept the premise that a group of people should have the power of violence over you and your neighbors, at some point you will realize that you have unleashed a leviathan from Pandora's box that you cannot control. Then the best we can hope for is getting down on our knees and BEGGING our masters for freedom? Is that how pathetic we are? Come on now, let's have some dignity. 

My suggestion would be to talk to your friends, family, neighbors about the nature of government, the nature of using violence to solve complex social problems, and whether they would have you shot for disagreeing with their politics or not. Also, don't worry so much about what the government does. Violence will do violent things until people get bored with using violence to solve problems. But I would worry about the friends, neighbors, co-workers and others around you who do want create such a violent state of affairs and have this illusion that they can control it; even have you destroyed if you should try to dissuade them from it.

"That no government, so called, can reasonably be trusted, or reasonably be supposed to have honest purposes in view, any longer than it depends wholly upon voluntary support."-- Lysander Spooner

Afterthoughts:
The Amazing Atheists shares his thoughts on this. I pretty much agree