In episode 23 of the seventh season of The Simpsonsseveral bears are seen by the residents of Springfield, in different parts of the city, generating tension and protests throughout the community. The characters created by Matt Groening They delve into a story in which municipal taxes, political management and migration are discussed. Nine years later, a true story, with certain nuances, was replicated in the North American town of Grafton. The libertarian epic of that community against the bears became popular in the American national media and once again positioned the phrase “memetics” about what “The Simpsons predicted it.”
“In 2004, hundreds of people moved to Grafton to found what they called the Free Town Project and demonstrate the feasibility of libertarianism by creating a utopian community,” explained the American journalist Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling to the BBC Mundo portal.
In 2020, the reporter wrote the book “A Libertarian Walks into a Bear”, in which he recounted what happened in Grafton. This town in the state of New Hampshirebordering Canada, witnessed a unique political and social experience when libertarian politicians controlled the local municipality.
“Libertarians studied dozens of towns in New Hampshire before settling on Grafton, but Grafton was attractive for several reasons: A libertarian named John Babiarz, who ran for governor. He also had a small population, approximately a thousand people, which meant that a relatively small number of libertarian voters could exert enormous influence when approving municipal ordinances and taxes,” the journalist explained.
Hongoltz-Hetling, in her book, stated that in a matter of months about two hundred libertarians, most of whom met online, moved to the town to launch the Free People Project. The new neighbors were mostly white men, single, and supporters of gun ownership.
As a result of this migration, the number of people living in mobile homes or in tents in the forests surrounding the town increased significantly. In that aspect, the profile of the newcomers was very varied, although some had a lot of money, the majority were poor and had nothing that tied them to their places of origin.
“Grafton had a deep history of rebellion against authority. At the end of the 18th century he voted to separate from the then newly formed USA for fiscal reasons, and many of its inhabitants exercised fiscal disobedience, refusing to pay all types of taxes,” the journalist clarified to the British media and regarding the libertarians, he added: “They were very active and participated in the local political process, which “It allowed them to impose many of their ideas on the community.”
The newcomers convinced their neighbors to cut 30 percent of the municipal budget, which was just $1.3 million. This with the promise that the maneuver would translate into fewer taxes and more money in the pockets of the residents.
By 2011, Grafton’s streets were filled with potholes, street lighting was defective, garbage collection service almost disappeared, and policing waned because the police only had the resources to pay one full-time officer. The reduction in patrolling, along with the arrival of more armed residents, registered its first two murders in recent times in the last decade and there was a 12 percent increase in the number of violent crimes, according to regional statistics.
The climax of this political and management adventure came when the residents had to deal with a wave of bear attacks. The assaults of these animals turned Hongoltz-Hetling’s attention to this American county, where she found an explosive mix of deregulation, tax cuts and libertarian ideas. This is how his journalistic book was born “A Libertarian Walks into a Bear”, which became a best seller in his country. For 2016, the Free People Project had been shipwrecked and many of the libertarians who settled in Grafton left.
“The town’s budget has not grown to make up for the lost years and municipal services remain poor compared to other neighboring towns. However, the atmosphere is calmer than before, and there have been no more bear attacks,” the journalist recalled to the BBC and concluded: “The libertarians acted within the rule of law, so there was no reason for the authorities to intervene. state or federal authorities. The Grafton fiasco was in part the result of a fair democratic process, in which community-minded residents did not organize as effectively as libertarians.”
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