Introducing Cotometism
How cotometism emerged from my street, my questions, and the many people I’ve met
Once in a while, we throw a block party on my street.
That wouldn’t be remarkable except for this: the people who show up have almost nothing in common politically, religiously, or culturally.
We have Proud Boy weekend warriors and California-style naturopaths. A Jewish family, a Hindu family, African-American single dad, Filipino Catholics, lesbians, Baháʼí refugees, Serbian Orthodox. Mormons next to old union Democrats. Corporate managers, tradespeople, laborers, the self-employed, and retirees. Kids from every household running through each other’s yards, grown-ups passing around food and drinks.
And you know what? It works.
If there’s a power blackout, we check in on each other. We shovel sidewalks. We babysit each other’s kids. Compare notes on local schools. And no one seems to care much about who voted for whom.
You might think this shouldn’t make sense. But, here we are, it works. For me, it raised a deeper question: How can all of this function so well when so many other spaces—especially political ones—feel broken?
The Confusing Truth: I Admire Many People
This wasn’t just a neighborhood thing. It echoed something I’d been wrestling with for years.
I admire people across the ideological map.
Libertarians who defend personal freedom. Liberal economists who think about value in systems and their parts. Conservative veterans who emphasize duty, honor, sacrifice. Social workers who show up for a family when nobody else will.
Each seems to profess something legitimate and vital. But their views often contradict. Their rhetoric can clash. Their ideas conflict.
That contradiction sat with me uncomfortably. I wondered if my own principles lacked conviction because I could see value in such different perspectives. On the other hand, perhaps each offered a piece of something meaningful. If so, what was it?
Everyday Contradictions that Got Me Thinking
One puzzle grabbed me early: volunteer fire departments.
If self-reliance is an American ideal, why do so many towns organize fire brigades run entirely by volunteers? Nobody forces them. Nobody pays them. Yet people train for years, buy their own gear, and risk their lives for neighbors they may not even like. That doesn’t look like individualism. It looks like something else entirely.
Another puzzle: billionaires.
We admire them for their vast wealth, for their boldness and power. They’re icons of success. We also admire when they give that money away—sometimes billions at a time. Suddenly, the same person who was celebrated for acquiring wealth is celebrated for parting with it. Why do we cheer both? We can’t be admiring only the money.
A third puzzle hit closer to home: neighbors with guns.
Some of my neighbors—including the weekend-warrior Proud Boys—keep firearms. That unsettles me. I worry about gun violence. And yet, I also rely on these same neighbors. We borrow tools, watch each other’s kids, share food at block parties. So here’s the contradiction: I know the risks of widespread gun ownership, but I also trust these armed neighbors to look out for me when things get rough. How do both of those attitudes make sense at once?
And then there’s the Pittsburgh Left.
If you don’t know it, here’s the play: when the traffic signal turns green, a driver turning left across oncoming traffic gets to go first, even though the law says they should absolutely wait. In most cities, that would cause consternation. In Pittsburgh, it’s expected, even polite. So how did this casual law-breaking become a local tradition?
At first glance, none of these add up. They look inconsistent—sometimes even irrational.
- Rugged individualists forming fire brigades.
- Celebrating both wealth accumulated and wealth given away.
- Fearing gun violence but trusting gun-owning neighbors.
- Casually breaking a law to help traffic flow better.
But, what if they’re not actually contradictions? What if they’re all the same pattern: people protecting and creating conditions that let others—and themselves—live more freely?
That thought was the start of grasping cotometism. These weren’t random quirks of human behavior. They were all signs of the same underlying conditions of life.
Every person has one life. That one life is vulnerable. It can’t be fully protected alone.
Every person wants the power to shape their life on their own terms. Cotometism calls that Life Autonomy—the capacity to make choices and take actions that provide them with meaning and satisfaction.
Because Life Autonomy is also at risk, people find ways to sustain it—for themselves and for others. Cotometism calls that Reciprocity—voluntarily protecting the conditions of others’ autonomy, because in the long run that’s the only way to preserve your own.
How Cotometism Explains These Contradictions
Now that I had words for it—Life Autonomy and Reciprocity—the puzzles I’d been carrying around started to make more sense. Each one, in its own way, was showing the same underlying pattern.
Is No One a Libertarian When Their House Is on Fire?
A friend of mine once remarked: “No one is a libertarian when their house is on fire.”
Certainly, it was provocative. Nonetheless, in a crisis, you need backup. You call for help. You’re vulnerable—and you’re not too proud to admit it. If self-reliance were enough, volunteer fire departments wouldn’t exist. But they do—and they endure as beloved institutions.
The principles of cotometism can explain. Fire reveals how Life Autonomy is not secure: in one bad night, a family can lose everything. A household that installs smoke alarms, buys insurance, and keeps an extinguisher handy is already exercising Life Autonomy—taking steps to shape and protect their own lives. That’s the self-reliance people respect. But no matter how prepared they are, a fire can still outstrip what a single household can handle.
That’s where Reciprocity enters. Volunteer fire departments are reciprocity in action: neighbors committing to defend each other’s Life Autonomy, knowing that in some other circumstance they will depend on the same protection.
Cotometism holds both truths together: Life Autonomy enables people to take responsibility for themselves, and Reciprocity protects it when individual effort is not enough.
Billionaire Philanthropy
Let’s look again at billionaires. We admire them for accumulating wealth, and for its power to shape conditions to fit their desires. That’s one form of autonomy.
But then we admire them again when they give fortunes away. How can we celebrate both?
Cotometism shows why: money’s value depends on whether its power is used to expand or contract Life Autonomy. Hoarded, money narrows autonomy by concentrating control in a few hands. But directed toward vaccines, education, or clean water, it creates new protections and choices for millions. That’s Reciprocity at scale: idle resources used to expand the conditions of freedom for others, which also stabilizes freedom for all.
Gun Safety and the Proud Boys
The same lens explains the gun puzzle. Guns can feel like a threat to autonomy. But in practice, I rely on armed neighbors I trust—people who respect their weapons and who, I believe, would defend any of us if it came to that.
Cotometism doesn’t deny the risk. It asks whether the presence of guns expands or shrinks Life Autonomy. When weapons are locked, practiced, and respected, they strengthen the capacity to defend freedom against coercion. When they’re flaunted, stolen, or misused, they corrode trust and shrink autonomy.
Defense of Life Autonomy is the first function of Reciprocity. Liberty isn’t just freedom to act; it’s the assurance that others will help guard that freedom when it’s under threat.
The Pittsburgh Left
Even the Pittsburgh Left fits the pattern. On paper, it’s law-breaking: a driver turning left across traffic is invited to proceed first when the light turns green. By the book, that should cause chaos.
But in Pittsburgh, it’s Reciprocity in miniature. Pittsburgh’s hills and valleys don’t offer much room for wider roads or additional turning lanes. Oncoming drivers trade a few seconds of their own time to prevent gridlock and keep everyone moving. By letting the left-turner go first, they expand autonomy for all: more flow, less frustration, fewer missed appointments.
It only works because trust sustains it. If too many drivers refused, the whole pattern would collapse. But as long as enough people honor it, everyone benefits. That’s Reciprocity: voluntary, mutual, durable.
What looked like contradictions turned out to be signals of the same truth:
- Life Autonomy is always at risk—every person has one life to live, and it can’t be secured alone.
- Reciprocity is how people choose to reinforce one another’s freedom, because in the long run it’s the only way to preserve their own.
Cotometism doesn’t replace self-reliance with dependency, or liberty with control. It shows how individual strength and voluntary cooperation fit together, sustaining the only life each of us gets.
The Invitation
So here’s what I concluded:
The street I live on works not because we all agree—but because we all act in ways that reinforce each other’s freedom to live. No one’s dominating. No one’s converting. No one’s depending.
We look out for one another.
Now that we have these two principles, Life Autonomy and Reciprocity, we can start to see that their usefulness extends beyond block parties, fire brigades, or quirky traffic customs.
Together, they offer insights into more sectors:
- Politics reframed as competing promises of protection: fostering independence, looking after others, or ensuring fairness.
- Policy designed not only for efficiency, but for protecting people’s capacity to shape their own lives.
- Healthcare measured not only by survival, but by restored agency and choice.
- Education aimed at preparing children not only for jobs, but for resilient, purposeful lives.
Cotometism’s approach becomes a lens. Once you see Life Autonomy and Reciprocity working together, you begin to notice them across the range of human action, from daily habits to national institutions. You might even interpret people’s words and actions a little differently.
This first essay only opens the door. In future posts, we’ll explore how cotometism applies to both everyday living and the hardest problems we face together.
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