Tom Woods

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secr...@lp.org

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Apr 23, 2022, 4:09:29 PM4/23/22

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Fellow Members,

At this point I’m not really sure where I stand so I’m not sure if this should be considered debate in favor or against. More than anything it’s me laying out the points that are currently weighing on me.

History and Biases: I am not a regular follower of Tom Woods but I do think, in the limited capacity in which I have heard him, he is a well-spoken voice for liberty. My first encounter with Tom Woods is actually the speech that got me personally motivated to take my county party more seriously, start a YT channel, later I became a state Treasurer, State Chairman, started a podcast, and now am LNC Secretary. I won’t say it was all because of Tom Woods but he was an influential factor. I’ll link the exact speech he gave at the LPTexas convention in 2012 that got me motivated and say that every couple years I watch it again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaKg2I_2-9E

Furthermore, I will say that I have been lucky enough in my lifetime to not have been a victim of SA or child grooming, though I personally know people who have and I recognize these acts to be serious violations of the NAP.

Grooming Allegations: The current allegations are troubling. An article released by Fakertarians outlines the history leading up to this point with citations https://fakertarians.wordpress.com/2022/04/10/your-facebook-friends-are-wrong-about-tom-woods/. I have heard many members criticize the source as being biased, not acting in good faith, or being unworthy of consideration. I’ll be honest I had previously heard the name but I don’t know anything about them. I’m not a fan or critic of theirs. At first glance they seem like exactly the kind of libertarian sensationalists that I don’t have time for. However, looking at this article specifically, there is some name-calling and unnecessary color commentary, that I ignore and wish wasn't there, but the details and citations are on point. To further challenge myself on this point I sent this article to a friend who I knew had a ticket to the Tom Woods event, was skeptical of the allegations, and was eager to see Tom Woods in Reno and asked them to, without regard for Fakertarians, poke holes in the evidence and citations. The feedback I got was “I read over the tom woods article and talked to a few people who know him personally. Honestly I'm torn, idk what to think of it. I know fakertarians is kind of a shit posting website, but the information they provide makes tom woods appear suspect . On the other hand I have people telling me he would never do that, he's not that kind of guy and he would be the first person to denounce grooming.” So at this point I am having serious trouble refuting the specific allegations this article raises.

Member Feedback: I have gotten a lot of member feedback on this topic from multiple sides which I will try to boil down into a few points.

“Let the members vote with their dollars.” I do find this argument persuasive to a degree, however to me it misses the larger point of the organization protecting its own interests and choosing who to do business with. These allegations are not minor allegations. Should we apply that standard to everyone? If a hypothetical and convicted statutory rapist were to ask to speak do we then say as long as you can sell tickets you can come. If a convicted assailant, murderer, or someone who otherwise violated the NAP said the same is this how we would react. I certainly would not.
“This is cancel culture” I don’t know if it is or isn’t but that’s largely due to the subjectivity of the term. What I do know is that we as a party have the right to associate with who we want and I regularly advocate for people to “cancel” bad actors at the ballot box. So in that vein I’m not against refusing to do business with someone due to conscientious objection.
“I know Tom Woods personally he’s a good person who would never” and “I know Tom Woods’ Ex Wife Personally and she can’t speak due to an NDA signed as part of the divorce but the situation is even worse than the article presents” I regard both of these as rumor until evidence comes out in support of this statement.
“If you let him speak I want a refund and will not attend” and “If you don’t let him speak I want a refund and will not attend” I consider the finances of this situation to be less important than the ethics of it but hopefully it is apparent that even if I was voting purely on financial interests the weird spot this puts me in.
“I don’t feel safe with him there” This one hurts my soul to know anyone feels unsafe at a convention for our party. I also know it is a big event with over 1,000 people. By the numbers, there are probably other people who have done bad things at this convention. Furthermore, I’m not sure that this motion solves the issue here because it doesn't ban him from coming and I suspect that even if the LNC revokes his invitation one of the various private events will invite him.
“We need to be sure beyond a reasonable doubt before we do anything” I personally don’t see that the standard of proof that exists to remove someone’s life or liberty is the same as the standard of proof to decide who you do business with.
“If we allow this after everything that has come out we send a message condoning it” I find this argument persuasive as well.
“If we allow him to be removed we condone bullying and open the flood gates to remove everyone else for political reasons” I find this argument persuasive but would like to see the evidence in the article refuted as part of this, which I have not.
“The people who like Tom Woods removed Vaush so it’s only right” I don’t care, I wasn’t involved in that, I honestly don’t know much about Vaush, and even if it was wrong it has nothing to do with this and two wrongs don’t suddenly cancel each other out.

That’s most of the feedback I can think of at this point. I am very conflicted and would be thrilled to see further evidence for or against the actual allegations raised before I vote.

Thank you,

John Wilford | LNC Secretary
442 Valley View Dr
Lewisville, TX 75067
903-372-6931 Mobile | www.lp.org

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John Phillips

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Apr 23, 2022, 7:06:23 PM4/23/22

to Lp

At some point we have to acknowledge the realities of being a growing political party that CLAIMS to be better than our opponents.

The evidence is pretty damning, but far from a court conviction I acknowledge freely.

As representatives of this party at some point we have to consider far beyond just that, or the people on either side who want to threaten their dollars (which seems to be pretty much a wash) most of whom were predisposed one way or the other to begin with.

We have to seriously look at things like how having a speaker not just accused, but with ay least a fair amount of evidence supporting, looks outside as well, and what might be more damaging. Sad that this has to be explained to so many people who opposed Vermin on that basis (not including you in that group, just a general statement.

In this case we have two potential negatives. The negative of 'canceling' a person without explicit proof, or the negative of an accused child groomer, some even say predator, being engaged to not just attend our convention, but speak at it. With the prior accusations - again with some evidence tho hardly court of law - of racism and GSM bigotry thrown in.

All the other complaints about it are really based on those, and/or personal bias and so imho amount to crap.

The difference in those 2 negatives is a pretty simple difference to me. Despite all the bs outcry otherwise, "cancel culture" is neither new, nor necessarily wrong. It has been used literally forever. One could very easily make the case that Jesus Christ had it used against him (and long term won that battle). Libertarians even argue for it all the time (while also railing against it hypocritically).

Which makes that far less of a crime than giving a platform to someone with these somewhat substantiated complaints.

It becomes even less so when one realizes that canceling his speech does not affect him monetarily. It does not even affect his ability to have an audience, as his followers have well proven that they just don't care and will follow him regardless. Even being caught flat out in lies during his own defensive statements they are happy to completely ignore. It does not affect his ability to attend, or even speak from the floor.

So canceling his speech does 0 harm to him.

Not canceling it tho ... The party will be argued to celebrate child predators. People will use it to say that they are right in their complaints that we don't care about these issues - and arguably be right. We will be telling many of our own members we do not care about their victimization enough to even be careful who we choose to speak to them.

Even more sad is how many of the people screaming in his defense were more than happy to scream at Arvin for simply making arguments defending this sort of behavior, and were more than happy to cancel him (and make no mistake, I am not saying that was wrong to do, his remarks were ... not good).

The question in my mind is not how can we support cancelling his appearance, it is how can we not!

If he really cares about this party he would offer to steo aside himself, just as I did during any kerfluffle regarding myself. I offered to self cancel my appearances if the party felt they would be harmful to their event. For any reason. Sometimes that offer was accepted. Sometimes it was not.