Everyman Is An Island

A commonly raised objection to the sovereignty of the individual is the cliche saying,
“No man is an island.”
Or so they say, having read such out of a text book or annotated from a statist professor’s mouth. This objection is raised to say that no one is completely isolated from society, and is part of some larger whole like the community and thus is not sovereign but rather a cog in the machine of civil society.
But I will contend that every man is an island, and that the metaphor is incomplete without the water that distinguishes a mountain from an island.
Imagine these islands connected by a vast ocean. Let there be trade and commerce amongst the islands. Let the islands not be invaded by another.
Do any one of the islands have a right to dictate what happens on another? Or a right to occupy another island? To destroy another island? No! Each individual is sovereign, as these islands are.
But let us recognize the community between them, the ocean that allows seafaring and trade. The islands are free to associate with each other, give or trade resources, to enrich destitute islands with mutual consent, but let us be reminded that no one island has a right anymore than another to force any of these activities.
Does this change if a group of islands band together, draw up a federation, and declare arbitrary authority over the other islands? No. They still are but specs of dirt in the ocean, whatever name they choose to go by.
Now, deconstruct the metaphor. People own themselves, and a collection of people has no right of authority over any other person or persons.
Join The Discussion
10 CommentsThoughts? Comments?
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Randall Chester Saunders November 19, 2017 , 9:09 pm Vote0
Eric, you are doing something wrong. Your articles do not show up. Only get
404 page not found
Page Not Found
Randy
Eric Sharp November 19, 2017 , 9:27 pm
@saunders Yeah, I’m not sure why though. Any ideas for how to fix that?
Mal Roarke is a pseudonym... November 20, 2017 , 12:38 am Vote1
@ericasharp
Go to Settings » Permalinks, and simply click on Save Changes button. This will update your permalinks settings and flush rewrite rules. In most cases this solution fixes the WordPress posts 404 error. However, if it does not work for you, then you probably need to update your .htaccess file manually.Oct 8, 2017
More here how to do that. Youtube etc walk you thru
http://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-fix-wordpress-posts-returning-404-error/
AtlasAikido
Eric Sharp November 22, 2017 , 4:02 am Vote0
On Liberty.me it appears that the permalinks function is not enabled for regular users like us. I don’t have all the permissions like plug ins that a standard user would have. I think an admin will have to do this.
This is pretty frustrating that each article I write is 404ed as soon as its posted.
Mal Roarke is a pseudonym... November 22, 2017 , 5:51 am
@ericasharp If you try to build a new article, you will see 3 horizontal lines left top corner.
When you click on that you will see an articles button.
In there perhaps you will see your articles. And could click on them one by one and review and copy off to Gmail so you have back up copies.
You could also try to build a completely new stream…
And let the existing one go if the second new thread is a go.
It’s what I would do in the same situ..
Atlas
Eric Sharp November 24, 2017 , 3:52 pm Vote0
I’ve tried deleting the site, but my confirmation email doesn’t arrive …
Mal Roarke is a pseudonym... November 22, 2017 , 6:12 am Vote0
@ericasharp contact @grantbrown Re 404 page error Eric is having. I cannot remember where the problem ticket opening icon is. So copying you directly.
Thanks,
Atlas
Eric Sharp November 24, 2017 , 3:51 pm Vote1
Thanks Mal, just sent @grantbrown a message.
Ken Jons-un November 27, 2017 , 4:21 pm
@atlasaikido I don’t think Grant works with the site anymore but I did mention the problem with Eric’s blog to support@liberty.me while communicating another problem. They have fixed it now. 🙂
ericasharp.liberty.me/everyman-is-an-island/
Eric Sharp December 4, 2017 , 1:24 am Vote1
They sure did, thanks Ken.