My Boyfriend, John Locke
Field Notes from My Libertarian Sidequest
Collage by me.
I’ve always believed that part of loving someone is trying to understand them—especially when you don’t. One of the sharpest minds I’ve known happens to be Libertarian. I once asked, half-joking, “If Libertarianism is so great, where are all the women?”1 But then I quietly placed several Libertarian novels and short story collections on hold at the library. Fiction, because this is my sidequest and I’ll run it how I want. And fiction goes down easiest. To put it mildly, I had a few other things to focus on earlier this year.
For any earnest friend hoping to shepherd me back to ideological safety: Please unclench. Curiosity isn’t treason, and rigidity is boring. If we’re talking Magdalene coded projects, a Libertarian detour feels natural. She’s all anti-Power, and self-containment; I’m not sure she’d agree with the exact route but, let’s see.
I signed up for a Cato Institute event in DC over the summer along with a conference I really wanted to attend. But then, I got sick and couldn’t go. Luckily, there was another in late October hosted in New York. It was held at the Harvard Club.
My heels clicked pleasingly on the tile. People in tan slacks and navy blazers leaned over small coffee tables, hair pushed back like choir boys. Dark wood paneling and oil portraits swam in my periphery. It felt studious in the way only very old money can manage.
The event itself was held in a large hall: forty-foot ceilings, more portraits of dead guys, and its crown feature: a massive taxidermied elephant head hung dead center. Staring up at it I couldn’t help but think of the tiny wooden Ganesh statue I was gifted during my pandemic traveling time, now sitting on my altar at home. Ganesh could never.
Peter Goettler, Cato’s president and CEO, opened the night with the energy of a young Kris Kringle. Twinkling blue eyes, disarming warmth. “Some of our supporters are more right-leaning,” he said. “They’ll ask, ‘Aren’t we better than Democrats?’ Well, that’s a really low bar.” The crowd laughed, a bubbling murmur. He went on.
“We’re going to call out and push back when any president disappears people without due process. Or enacts extra-legal tariffs that threaten prosperity around the world. Or singles out law firms or political enemies for retribution.”
Some good news: the Cato Institute’s official stance is We don’t fuck with Trump. I’ve learned to be grateful for allies wherever they appear.
The panel featured a Gen X Cato economist, a Millennial Cato fundraising guy, and a Gen Z journalist who seemed to be there primarily to eye-fuck the Gen X guy. Later, a Republican woman I was chatting with referred to her as “Libertarian Barbie.” She wasn’t wrong. Her highlights were immaculate. I told her, “We don’t make fun of how people look—we make fun of them for who they are inside.”
The panel was, to no one’s surprise, aggressively anti-Mamdani. Most of the blame for the state of politics today went to TikTok. Their Gen Z rep dutifully confirmed that TikTok was, in fact, The Problem. Along with the scourge of pandemic-era online college and kids these days not knowing their history.
“When Gen Z was in 8th grade, only 1 in 5 was proficient in history,” she shook her head.
They had a table of free reading material. But technically, everyone over 40 had to pay for their ticket so in a way it was sponsored reading. And I do love free books. I took three—an introduction by one of the founding writers of the institute, one on globalization, and one on cancel culture from the Gen Z rep, affectionately: Libertarian Barbie.
I’m almost done with them. I have to take breaks in between the things I actually have to do to live. Every time I forget my book on my way to somewhere, I itch.
I’m enjoying the linear graphs and the logical fallacies. I’ve written lol in the margins at least ten times. But I get it, the appeal. I’m taking it seriously. Mainly, it’s just my thing with John Locke. The man has a way of getting under my skin.
I’ll give him this: 300 years later and he’s still annoying me. I can only pray for that kind of reach.
I was, after all, raised by a man. Athena to my father’s Zeus. A comparison maybe I got too late. The good parts aside, sometimes I am acting like my father in the bad ways.
I text my oldest friend: How do I stop myself from turning into all the bad parts??
She text back: Probably cash flow.
hannahnutter.com
we love a 300 year old boyfriend!!