THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE Number 448, December 16, 2007 "Bill of Rights Day: December 15" Attribute to The Libertarian Enterprise My best friend in the world is a compulsively murderous bitch. I'm not being vulgar. They say a man's best friend is his dog. We have several dogs, but my dog is a female pit bull who has an uncontrollable urge to attack and kill any nonhuman mammal in her territory. She's not real fond of lizards and snakes either, except as the occasional snack. She's gotten bored of going after doves and starlings, but when she was younger she could grab one out of the air on a regular basis. I think, but can't prove, that about eight years ago she got sick scragging enough mice to save her human family from a hantovirus outbreak. We keep her penned 21 hours a day, and carefully lock up the other critters when it's her turn to enjoy the yard. I'll behave and not brag on her intelligence except to mention that I saw her apply inductive reasoning at least once. Her main purpose in life seems to be to sit on my lap and have me scratch the good spot on her shoulder blades. The reason we kept her (she's a rescued stray that no one claimed) is that she made it clear she needed to be my dog and we didn't have the heart to put her up for adoption. It seems that my intelligent, brave, and viciously predatory little buddy is also a compulsive masochist and I got stuck with the job of being her top. She loves all people in general, is especially affectionate and gentle with kids the few times I've let her be with them (On a very short leash with my hand inches from her collar to control her, I am not that big a damn fool.). But more than anything else she needs to know her daddy loves her. Turns out that most dogs are like this, even the most vicious junkyard dogs. They need to love and feel loved by humans, especially one special human. This is the result of a genetic mutation, or more likely several genetic mutations, that occurred among wolves that lived around humans . The consequences of this change (these changes) were: A. Dogs never really grow up. One visible effect is that their snouts remain smaller (As L. Neil Smith points out in the quote from Phoebius Krumm that he includes currently at the end of his internet writings ) and their color/patterns are more indistinct. More importantly they don't emotionally mature and remain psychologically dependent on their surrogate parents (humans). B. At a genetic level dogs need to accept at least one special human, if not an entire family of humans, as their alphas in a pack hierarchy. C. Dogs are essentially genetically bound slaves to human . By the way, cats have the same mutation(s) except they just don't give enough of a damn over who is and isn't alpha to be very good slaves. As a fan of science fiction and horror one thing that I can imagine and which scares me witless is the occurrence of this mutation(s) in humans. Of course, in the wild, this mutation (and enough with allowing for multiple mutations already) is contrasurvival since non alphas (or at least non potential alphas) usually don't breed. However, humans depend on their cultural heritage (memes) as much or more than on their genes to survive and successfully reproduce. Add to this that alpha status is not a prerequisite for humans to breed. For millennia tyrants have tried to create a culture that teaches humans to be childish and happy slaves, the same as my murderous buddy Petie is. In an earlier article I argued that we must change our languages to reject any positive value in submitting to tyranny. Now I am arguing that we must reject all aspects of human culture that encourage submission to slavery and glorify extending adolescence into biological adulthood (past 21 to allow for full brain development). They must be replaced by values and cultural aspirations that reward liberty and the acceptance of adult responsibility to control one's own destiny. Before the habits of slavery are so built into our culture that liberty becomes unimaginable and that the "slave gene" gets introduced without anyone noticing the difference. By the way, due to sexual selection the human snout has become flatter over the years, there are even people with jaws so small they don't grow wisdom teeth.
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