Thanks to Donna Moxley from New Hampshire Public Radio for this report:
The City of Keene has an image of being—well a little more Vermont than New Hampshire…more liberal than libertarian.
So it’s a little surprising that Keene would be the setting for a series of demonstrations that have drawn attention to the libertarian Free State Project.
But as Keene Sentinel’s Donna Moxley reports, much of the ruckus is coming not from the Free Staters……but from the Free Keeners
Varrin Swearingen moved to Keene as part of the Free State Project.
He wanted to be part of a movement that thought about freedom the way he does.
Swearingen has since become the project’s President and spokesman.
“our goal as an organization is to attract 20,000 pro-liberty activists to move to New Hampshire, anywhere in NH, not necessarily Keene, and so that’s what I’ve been focusing my efforts on mostly since moving to NH“
Swearingen writes the occasional letter to the editor and he unsuccessfully ran for State Representative as a Republican two years ago.
He has a family, a job as a pilot, and his Christian faith.
His Free State activism focuses almost solely on recruiting new people to come to the state for the Project.
He says the group is more than halfway to the 20,000 member goal.
The Free State Project’s official stance defines freedom as living under a government that, at its maximum, provides protection of life, liberty and property.
The idea essentially is that individuals naturally have rights and freedom, liberty, and that that ought to be protected, and government’s purpose is to protect that, not to violate that for some other social gain like welfare or war, or fill in the blank, it could be anything.
The idea of freedom, unsurprisingly, is open to much debate among the activists.
And Swearingen feels some of the Free Staters are approaching this cause with such zeal that it’s becoming counterproductive.
If you engage in some form of activism, that angers people such that they move in the opposite direction … that is they want more government to take care of some perceived problem, and maybe the perceived problem is caused by those activists, then that is indeed a problem.”
He makes no secret he’s referring to the so-called Free-Keeners.
“There are many Free State Project participants who aren’t particularly happy with what’s going on in Free Keene, some have been very vocal about that. Some of the more controversial things like bullhorns at the Middle School and the public nudity stuff, and, you know the candelight vigils outside public officials’ homes and whatnot – those kinds of things are pretty provocative and I personally think that’s not the right way to go about things.”
There was also the pot smoking demos in the town square and the challenge to the public drinking rules at City Council meetings.
Those demonstrations involved drinking games in the chambers and resulted in arrests.
The force behind Free Keene is Ian Freeman.
He moved here for the Free State Project from Sarasota, Florida in 2006.
His activism is his job, and includes the Free Keene blog site he created and his radio show, Free Talk Live which airs on several stations across the state.
Freeman’s principles go beyond the Free State Project’s idea of limited government to the point of no government at all.
“I think it’s pretty clear that government is a monopoly on violence and that whatever positive ends they might involve themselves in … there are means that are immoral, that essentially the government coerces people to participate in their process.”
If the ends are so worthy, he says, people shouldn’t have to be forced to help.
Government threatens people and it scares people and it hurts people and so no matter what it does in its ends if its means are corrupt then it’s a problem.
He doesn’t like to call himself an anarchist.
The term has suffered from a century and a half of bad press.
So, he prefers the term “voluntarist.”
He also prefers to be called Ian Freeman, though he was born Ian Bernard.
And Freeman knows people have gotten annoyed at the tactics Free Keeners have used to challenge the status quo.
In fact, local frustration came to a head in August as the group staged its second challenge to the no drinking rules at a city council meeting.
Another group was there to meet them, sporting signs that said “Free Keene from the Free Keene Stigma.”
Café owner James Calloway was one of the counter-protesters.
“They don’t even do what they claim they’re doing most of the time, like whenever the cops show up they’re not really smoking pot, or when they’re doing their drinking game at city council, they’re not actually drinking beer, they’re drinking near-beer, or they’re drinking water … don’t make this stupid little label that says this is not a beer, and drink water. They’re just acting like idiots.”
Since then, there have been signs of civilized discourse.
Heika Courser, a Free Keener arrested for publicly drinking while having her breasts painted, issued a letter of apology to the city council for her behavior.
The Free Keene From the Free Keene Stigma group organized a mixer at a public park and invited the Free Keene group.
And Swearingen, the president of the Free State Project, is still working to recruit more activists to move to NH.
For NHPR News, I’m Donna Moxley in Keene.
