Imagine your average neighborhood mafia: A scary armed group of people who plan, organize, and undertake regular extortion runs (meaning money raised by means of threat or use of aggression) at local businesses, in exchange for the “protection” they afford them.
Now imagine this mafia allowing the people of its district to submit votes, allowing them to choose who will be the main guy or party in charge of all its extortion runs.
Now imagine this mafia extending their extortion runs to every single working resident within its territory, demanding a percentage of incomes earned.
Now imagine this mafia demanding that the residents pro-actively send in the tribute “owed” and supply every detail about how much they earned and how and where in order to avoid having someone knock on their doors to collect.
Now imagine this mafia borrowing money from local and remote investors, against the collateral of future extortion proceeds which they then use, among other things, to expand their scope of intrusion into the lives of the residents.
Now imagine this mafia setting up learning camps that it funds with money from increased extortion threats. For generations moving forward the mafia would determine the curriculum used to educate the children of residents and shape their beliefs accordingly.
Now imagine this mafia establishing a bank where it prints its own currency the use of which it makes compulsory by demanding it in extortion payments, and by threatening aggression against anyone who doesn’t accept it in the settlement of debts and anyone who dares to compete in the production of currency.
Now imagine this mafia establishing its own permanent standing army, equipped with tanks, grenades, nukes, fighter jets, aircraft carriers, bases, helicopters, etc.
Now imagine this mafia establishing an institution where it approves or denies drug producers the right to sell drugs to its residents. Producers need to pay fees and wait for years before they’re granted this right.
Now imagine this mafia using its arms to attack other mafia gangs of other adjacent and remote territories, year by year killing millions of non-mafia residents in the process, all funded by money from increased tribute demanded in extortion threats and money borrowed against the promise of payment from yet more future extortion threats.
Now imagine this mafia setting up buildings with giant cages where it locks away people who don’t follow its orders, such as the prohibition against owning or selling certain pieces of harmless vegetation, or resistance against extortion payments.
Now imagine this mafia using extorted money or money borrowed against future extorted money to reward connected businessmen who made bad or economically harmful decisions with other people’s money.
Now imagine this mafia setting up thousands upon thousands of regulatory boards, institutions, departments, sub-departments, and agencies, equipped with rules, decrees, and the police force necessary to enforce them by shaking down businesses or individuals who are in violation of any of such rules or decrees.
Now imagine this mafia operating on a nationwide scale.
Imagine people having been “educated” in those compulsory education camps over the decades, telling you with a straight face that it is this mafia that we need in order to protect us from people who may steal from or aggress against us!
Imagine all these things and you get the largest and most dangerous mafia gang of all – the state.