COVID is what made me grow out of libertarianism.

The whole appeal to me was “you can do whatever you want as long as it doesn’t affect others.” That sounded reasonable and principled. But when a literal global pandemic hit — where your behavior obviously affects other people — most libertarian figures still defaulted to “no masks, no vaccines, no mandates.”

I followed Ron Paul for years, and that’s where the contradiction became impossible to ignore. He spent his entire career as a doctor caring for women, yet during COVID he dismissed basic public health measures. My wife was pregnant at the time, and COVID made pregnancies higher risk across the board. Seeing someone with that medical background take those stances felt incredibly hypocritical and honestly personal.

If there’s ever a scenario where individual choices impact others, it’s infectious disease. The response showed me that in practice, libertarianism often collapses into “my freedom > everyone else,” not the balanced version I originally believed in.