We very rarely ask ourselves what is the true purpose for a society’s
existence because we just assume it exists without any effort on our
part. It is important to ask ourselves this question because knowing
its purpose will determine the proper way in which we should think of
it.

Most of us just assume that society exists and that we, being members
of that society, just wake up, go to work, and function within it
without ever considering what it is we are functioning in. We are
like fish who just assume the water is there but we should begin ask
the question of what is the nature of the water we swim in.

Most of us assume that the purpose of society is to provide a place
for us to meet our social needs that satisfy our emotional needs for
companionship and belonging. That is not the true purpose of society
but only one of the beneficial byproducts of it.

In order to understand why we have the thing called society we must
look at why the first societies formed thousands of years ago. It was
(and still is) not possible for one person to survive on their own so
they grouped with other people who had the same basic needs for
survival as they did. This was the first society which was formed in
order to better meet the economic needs of its members such as food,
water, and shelter.

Now lets fast forward to the present and ask ourselves once again what
the purpose of society is. The basic needs for food, water, and
shelter have not changed since the early days of our history and our
modern society really has evolved from that first society so it still
serves the basic function of meeting our mutual economic needs and
without that basic need society has not reason to exist. Just look
what happens to small towns when the plant that has been providing
jobs for the people closes. The society of that small town vanishes
overnight. It did not matter how much people liked each other or the
town because it ceased to exist the minute the economic needs of its
members could no longer be met.

Societies have been and always will be an economic invention of man
much like a corporation, business, or barter club is and once we
understand this we must ponder what kind of economic system that
society should have. A society at its smallest unit is the person and
a person by himself is immune from any other person’s will since there
is no other person. In order to preserve that independence a society
of more than one person must allow each member to trade freely with
another since it preserves how each member is to interact with another
thus preserving their individual freedom.

A society that does not control or inhibit the ability for people to
trade freely with other members is a free society since the power of
choice that each member has over how their economic needs are to be
met are preserved. They can make a choice about what home they want
to buy, what chemicals they wish to ingest, what food to eat, and just
about most everything else they want to do as long as another member
wishes to provide that to them. Each member’s material existence is
determined by their own free-will which allows them to pursue their
own wishes in life.

Once we realize that society is an economic invention it destroys the
cult-like feeling that happens when we define a society by ideas or
values since economic inventions are completely devoid of ideas. This
kills the cult of fellowship mentality that compels us to embrace
certain ideas in order to be a member of the society/cult. This
allows us to function as independent persons within society who are
completely free to form whatever ideas that they want since they are
not compelled by some internal tribal impulse to conform.

The opposite is what fascist and communist preached which was
anti-capitalist (free-market) rhetoric. They knew that if you can
destroy the people’s ability to freely decide on how to meet their own
economic needs through the free interaction with other members it
would destroys their ability to move freely within that society. The
reason for this outcome is that society, be definition, is an economic
invention so to control the movement of goods from one person to the
other controls how each member of that institution interacts with one
another. It essentially gives them power over the institution which
is why most governments in history detested free-trade because it robs
them of the control over the institution itself.

This is why it is better to be a free capitalist-pig because a free
pig eats when and what he wants since those choices are immune from
the control of other pigs.

Edward Browning Bosley
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