RE: Fear of Voluntaryism due to Statist Thinking
I see what you're getting at but I don't agree with the logic.
Taxes do not steal part of your life because they do not steal any time away from you. They don't even steal any of your labor. If it does "steal" something then I'd say that it steals part of your perceived value of your labor.
Let's say your labor is worth 100$ per hour. Less taxes, you're left with 70$ in your hand. The value of your labor is still 100$ but from your perspective it's only 70$. So you feel that 30$ has been stolen from you.
On the other hand, you could think of it in a different way. What if the value of your labor is really only 70$ but the government "steals" 30$ from the buyer? It's just that you're collecting the 30$ on behalf of the government which you remit to them later.
My point is, some things are facts and some things are merely opinions based on perspective. Having to pay taxes, that's a fact. That taxes are the equivalent of stealing, that's an opinion. We can easily agree on facts but it's much more difficult to agree on opinion because different people have different perspectives.
By the way, let's pretend I agree with the first part of your statement. Are you free? Yes. Free people get things stolen from them all the time. You are free to try and stop me from stealing. Or, you are free to can go and live somewhere else where I can't steal from you. You are free because I have no control over your actions and you have complete freedom of movement. You just need to be aware that your actions have consequences and I'm also free to react to your actions accordingly.
My effective tax rate is at least a third of my income. That's me working for a third of the year to pay those taxes. That's a LOT of time and a third of my life.
When I am forced to pay something against my will like a "property tax" on a vehicle I was already taxed on when I bought it, that is absolutely without question THEFT. That's not an opinion. The government comes up with ways to extract money from people for the costs it has. If the government was as small as it should be, none of the ridiculously long list of taxes I have to pay would exist. They wouldn't be needed.
You can write what you did in the last paragraph, but ask Peter Schiff's father about it. Oh, wait. You can't. He died in prison because the IRS put him there for failure to pay their taxes. I am not free without paying part of my life, the time I spend laboring, to stay out of prison--or worse avoid being shot.
We'll never agree on this issue. Thanks for the conversation!