[taurknaut]

> seems like the nature of the world is eat or be eaten

Surely this applies to how individuals consider states, too. States generally wield violence, especially in the context of "national security", to preserve the security of the state, not its own people. I trust my own state (the usa) to wield the weapons it funds and purchases and manufactures about as much as I trust a baby with knives taped to its hands. I can't think of anything on earth that puts me in as much danger as the pentagon does. Nukes might protect the existence of the federal government but they put me in danger. Our response to 9/11 just created more people that hate my guts and want to kill me (and who can blame them?). No, I have no desire to live in a death cult anymore, nor do I trust the people who gravitate towards the use of militaries to not act in the most collectively suicidal way imaginable at the first opportunity.

[robertlagrant]

> I can't think of anything on earth that puts me in as much danger as the pentagon does

Possibly true, but the state is also responsible for the policing that means the pentagon is your greatest danger.

[Agentus]

yeah it sucks, but if the US gave up its death cult ways then youd still probably eventually live in one as a new conquering force fills in the void which seems inevitably going by history.