Back in late November, SFL Mid-Atlantic Director Irena Schneider wrote a letter to the editor of the Eagle, American 
University’s student newspaper, defending her group from a recent article and clarifying exactly what we are fighting for.
“What motivates us is not merely a desire to fight government policies. For libertarians, capitalism is not a system of power or oppression; it is a framework for government by the voluntary decisions of people and not by the point of a gun. Money cannot be racist, sexist or otherwise prejudiced. It is a means of exchange that gives society more than opportunity and prosperity: the lens of the free market is the most humane way of looking at the world.”
http://www.theeagleonline.com/opinion/story/letters-to-the-editor10
Then in early December Mikhail Romanov, a senior at AU, responded to her letter with one of his own. He fails to make any substantive points, mostly expressing his shock that anyone could be foolish enough to support a system which is obviously so evil:
“It seems Irena and her ilk somehow missed out on the economic developments of the last few years. They remain oblivious to the brutality of capitalism. Even the sheer size of the human costs of the financial crisis — evictions, foreclosures, layoffs, and hunger — seems to have had little impact on the so-called liberty movement.’ At a time when the failings of the free market are most evident, it is, indeed, baffling to witness the continued relevance of libertarianism.”
http://www.theeagleonline.com/opinion/story/letter-to-the-editor11
Irena, not one to take these accusations lightly, responded on January 13th with yet another letter of her own:
“But beyond policy discussions on the recession, Romanov’s query launches a moral attack on capitalism. Calling it “brutality,” his natural assumption is that we the workers have been violently oppressed by greedy businessmen. Indeed, who knew that repression of workers and customers was a sound business tactic? Who knew that respect for the right to life, liberty and property amounts to a murderous philosophy? It is easy to throw around accusations and generalize hatred to certain ideas, yet I cannot help but ask this speaker if the scores of millions of innocent, faceless lives mercilessly tortured and buried in history in numerous states not limited to the former USSR, China, Cambodia and North Korea, all for the sake of fraternal equality and triumphant workers’ power, was not a more appropriate depiction of “brutality”?”
http://www.theeagleonline.com/opinion/story/letter-to-the-editor12
Right on Irena, right on.
