David Koontz writes:
As I understand it the Libertarian Party qualifies membership to exclude any endorsement of violent overthrow of government. While some portion of those affected by this policy may well have gone underground, I don't believe that cypherpunks as a committee of the whole are willing or ready to do so.
The (contentious) Libertarian Party "pledge" has to do with the "initiation of force" in general. Most of us interpret this liberally, or as we wish, and certainly few feel it constrains our agenda.
Avoiding the appearance of endorsing the violent overthrow of government is prudent policy for any organization.
In any case, my understanding of U.S. law is that it's legal to advocate the overthrow of the government, it's legal to advocate the use of violence, it's just not legal to combine the two and advocate the _violent overthrow_ of the government. (I'm sure there are subtleties lost here. Certainly advocating violence that then _leads_ to violence may expose one to conspiracy, solicitation of a crime, etc., charges. But generally, neo-Nazis are relatively free to say "Kill all the Jews," provided they don't actually commit violence---things are changing with the new standards for "hurtful" and "discriminatory" speech, though. And rap musicians are free to chant about killing cops and so forth.) Overthrowing the government by force has never been a mainstream Cypherpunk position. Use of strong crypto to protect privacy has, and this may have some longterm implications for the form of government, however. (Things like enforceability of tax laws, of export laws, and speech laws. These will all be affected radically.) As others have noted, Cypherpunks have a range of political beliefs, from libertarian to socialist to ravist. -Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Note: I put time and money into writing this posting. I hope you enjoy it.