Feed: The Force of Peace - AggScore: 9.1

The Force of Peace

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Watching events in the Middle East including Egypt and Libya the thing that has stuck out to me is how effective peaceful demonstrations can be when masses of people join in.If a mass demonstration is empeacefulem, then any violence and force applied by the authorities is immediately seen as inappropriate and is frowned upon. And if the states use of force is escalated to include shooting peaceful protestors, then the states legitimacy is fatally undermined.In other words, truly peaceful demonstrations can push the state into a corner, where it either acquiesces or pulls out the guns and starts shooting.On the other hand, as I witnessed with violent protests in Greece, if protestors take it upon themselves to be emviolentem, then a violent response by the state is seen as appropriate and justified.To fight the state with violence is thus seen as counterproductive. And not only counterproductive, but emuselessem as the state has unlimited weapons at its disposal and can easily and always put down violent protest in the name of law and order and avoiding chaos.The Middle East uprisings have created a worldwide lesson in the effectiveness of peacefulness as a tactic and strategy of freedom. When masses of ordinary people stand up to the state empeacefullyem the state dare not show its true nature force and brutality less it completely delegitimise itself. For if any state violently attacks unarmed and peaceful protestors then such a state makes itself an international pariah.This is an amazing development in global consciousness of how to attain freedom which is spreading like wildfire via the internet. It also validates the theme of that great movie emV For Vendettaem which gave us the following great line emPeople should not be afraid of their governments, governments should be afraid of their peopleem.The lesson to be learned from the amazing scenes of recent weeks is that we as people have the power to call governments to account, to stand up to the state where necessary and to force it to comply with our wishes.The trick is to do it empeacefullyem and on en masse.

Offshore Bank Accounts: The Big Question

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Is it legal for Americans to open an offshore bank account This is a question often asked.

What is Offshore?

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Many people have an opinion about the word offshore, but few understand what it really means.

Defining Freedom

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Everybody is in favour of freedom, but unfortunately there is no genearal agreement as to what freedom actually means.

Protecting Your Cash

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Most people think that simply putting their money in the bank is sufficient, but there is a much better way.

The Case For Gold

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While most people are happy to call the paper in their wallet money, the fact is throughout history gold has been money of last resort.

A Simple But Radical Monetary Reform

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There is one very simple way to reform the money system, and that is simply to repeal legal tender laws.