Freedomain Radio

I am giving an informative (unbiased, educational) speech on the subject of taxation next Thursday in my communications class. I'm just dropping by here because I know many of you are well versed on the topic. I intend to equate taxation to theft, and thus violence. From a logical standpoint, it's rather clear that taxation is a form of violence; yet it is invisible to most people. I need to formulate a 4-6 minute speech that can convey this truth to a laymen audience. Concise is the word; I could use some help.

Your job will be to show the violence right away, and minimize the social contract as a counter argument (you don't have time to refute it but I think it should be addressed). Personally, I'd start the speech with George Washington chopping off the heads of Pennsylvanian farmers who didn't pay their taxes. This shows the brutal and violent nature of the system, shows there is no moral difference between then and now (even though the division of labor is more complicated).

Good luck with your speech. Post it here later if it's in a convenient form to do so!

The hard part is getting past existing presuppositions.

Maybe a good way to go about it would be to imagine a hypothetical situation in which there wasn't any government, but there WAS societal problems which needed money. Maybe to help the poor. Something that the people in your audience will support in principal. Then, you could ask your audience "how would we raise the money"?

After going over a couple of fundraising techniques - selling cookies, asking for donations, etc..., imagine a hypothetical person to suggests taxation (don't call it taxation - just describe it).

"Hey, I got an idea.", the man would say, "Oh, this is so good - we just go around and tell everybody that they HAVE to give us money".

"What if the people refuse to give you the money?", the rest of the people would ask.

"That's easy!", the man would say "...just tie them up, throw them in your car, bring them to a building surrounded by armed guards, and lock them in cage. After you do this a few times, the rest of the people will get the message and give you money without much fuss.".

"GREAT IDEA!", everyone says. "That would definately work, but it's that like stealing?"

"NO, because it's going to help poor people. That money will be used for good purposes. Sure, TECHNICALLY it's stealing, but we just won't CALL IT stealing. We'll just call something else- something official-sounding. How about "taxation"?"

...Something like that could be used as a rhetorical device. You may need to be a little creative, obviously, but I think that's a good method of getting past the reactionary response.

Caleob:

George Washington chopping off the heads of Pennsylvanian farmers who didn't pay their taxes

Do you have a reference for this?

socratesone:

Caleob:

George Washington chopping off the heads of Pennsylvanian farmers who didn't pay their taxes

Do you have a reference for this?

I did a quick search and didn't find anything, would also like some help w/ reference to this.

Agitpropist - Congrats on your courage to go straight for the difficult truth on this subject. Best of luck to you and go for it!

Having said that, have you watched Stef's latest bomb in the brain video? Just want you to go into this with realistic expectations, you may not get a very warm reception to the truth you plan to expose.

I like the advice socratesone gives, a metaphorical approach might be a good idea.

I'd be very interested in hearing how it goes on Thursday.

I did a little more research on this. George Washington did personally command the militia as it formed to suppress the Whiskey rebellion in the mid 1790's. However, the force was very large (over 12,000 men) which was larger than Washington commanded during much of the revolutionary war.

As might be expected against such overwhelming force the tax resistors returned to their homes and probably claimed they didn't know nothin' bout killin no tax collectors. Several arrests were made after the army arrived and 'pacified' the countryside but all were eventually acquitted or pardoned. 

Who knows the sorts of things the army did on it's march to the Western counties of Pennsylvania - but as no one was foolhardy enough to ride against Washington, I doubt he had to unsheath his sword.

Thank you for getting me to look a little more deeply into the issue, as I have probably overstated the historical case against Washington in the past and now I have a much better grasp on the events of leading up to and surrounding the Whiskey Rebellion. 

socratesone:

The hard part is getting past existing presuppositions.

Maybe a good way to go about it would be to imagine a hypothetical situation in which there wasn't any government, but there WAS societal problems which needed money. Maybe to help the poor. Something that the people in your audience will support in principal. Then, you could ask your audience "how would we raise the money"?

After going over a couple of fundraising techniques - selling cookies, asking for donations, etc..., imagine a hypothetical person to suggests taxation (don't call it taxation - just describe it).

"Hey, I got an idea.", the man would say, "Oh, this is so good - we just go around and tell everybody that they HAVE to give us money".

"What if the people refuse to give you the money?", the rest of the people would ask.

"That's easy!", the man would say "...just tie them up, throw them in your car, bring them to a building surrounded by armed guards, and lock them in cage. After you do this a few times, the rest of the people will get the message and give you money without much fuss.".

"GREAT IDEA!", everyone says. "That would definately work, but it's that like stealing?"

"NO, because it's going to help poor people. That money will be used for good purposes. Sure, TECHNICALLY it's stealing, but we just won't CALL IT stealing. We'll just call something else- something official-sounding. How about "taxation"?"

...Something like that could be used as a rhetorical device. You may need to be a little creative, obviously, but I think that's a good method of getting past the reactionary response.

 

I think this is great. It builds up from premises that your audience are likely to accept and works forwards rather than backwards with each step being simple.

socratesone:

The hard part is getting past existing presuppositions.

Maybe a good way to go about it would be to imagine a hypothetical situation in which there wasn't any government, but there WAS societal problems which needed money. Maybe to help the poor. Something that the people in your audience will support in principal. Then, you could ask your audience "how would we raise the money"?

After going over a couple of fundraising techniques - selling cookies, asking for donations, etc..., imagine a hypothetical person to suggests taxation (don't call it taxation - just describe it).

"Hey, I got an idea.", the man would say, "Oh, this is so good - we just go around and tell everybody that they HAVE to give us money".

"What if the people refuse to give you the money?", the rest of the people would ask.

"That's easy!", the man would say "...just tie them up, throw them in your car, bring them to a building surrounded by armed guards, and lock them in cage. After you do this a few times, the rest of the people will get the message and give you money without much fuss.".

"GREAT IDEA!", everyone says. "That would definately work, but it's that like stealing?"

"NO, because it's going to help poor people. That money will be used for good purposes. Sure, TECHNICALLY it's stealing, but we just won't CALL IT stealing. We'll just call something else- something official-sounding. How about "taxation"?"

...Something like that could be used as a rhetorical device. You may need to be a little creative, obviously, but I think that's a good method of getting past the reactionary response.

 

I think this is a great idea but I think the tone would damage the unbiased part of the presentation which would of course lower his grade and possibly have the added effect of being dismissed by more people than it otherwise would. Maybe instead of creating characters who propose ideas, perhaps propose each of the options yourself and give a short critique of each one, ending up at taxation (and like in the qouted post, describe it instead of saying it's taxation), and then from there equate your description with taxation and touch a bit on the ethics of modern society.

Mostly just try not to be preachy or mocking.

After the assignment, do you think you could post your transcript here and tells us how it went? I'm very interested to know how it'll pan out.