What is freedom?

A motion tending to anarchy.

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Freedom is having some laws, and the knowledge to know that you're better off with them.

I have always been baffled by the idea of anarchy. I loathe the current administration, but I would never prefer anarchy over them. Total chaos and loss of safety, only to slowly be replaced by a new person who would take charge (just as they opposed), is not my idea of freedom.

My idea of freedom is not being condemned for individual religion, opinions, and reasonings - yet having government. I think laws/rules are essential to living somewhat peacefully, at least compared to life without rules for everyone.

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I like Sanctuary's treatment of the subject, but I would add that there might be some advantage to giving the question a little more context. For example, there is a bondage to self from which the involvement in a community can free one. There is emotional bondage/freedom. There are degrees of freedom; a man freshly released from prison might revel in what he perceives as freedom that is absolute, whereas another man who is outwardly prosperous but immersed and obsessed by the events and politics of the day might see himself as hopelessly enslaved...

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Like Gulliver!

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Uh, I don't think that's where I was going.... Smile

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snood:-

I thought I was agreeing.Gulliver is tied down,not free,by a large number of obsessive obligations each one metaphorically represented by a string.If they were not obsessive they wouldn't be a problem.He is immersed in them.And he's prosperous from the physical point of view.

spendius.

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Sanctus:-

How about when the religion entails human sacrifice?Many religions have that.Some,I gather,still do.
How about temple prostitution?
There's many other things too.I don't think your definition is workable.It includes freedom and non-freedom at the same time.Its a bit rhetorical to say the least.

spendius.

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spendius wrote:

snood:-

I thought I was agreeing.Gulliver is tied down,not free,by a large number of obsessive obligations each one metaphorically represented by a string.If they were not obsessive they wouldn't be a problem.He is immersed in them.And he's prosperous from the physical point of view.

spendius.

I'm familiar with the story. Guess I wasn't thinking metaphorically.

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Freedom most often comes within the vacuum of the abolition of law. For example in olden times... Jews/Muslims/Christians treated the law with greater regard than today. For instance, there was not only reading, writing and arithmetic but "the law" took up another place in the fundamentals of child education. So by the age of 12 or 13 thirteen "all" children were "lawyers".

Freedom from the law... is to imply that there is a code of laws written within the nature of people/children and does not need to be "taught" so vigorously at such a young age. This protects the innocence of youth. Freedom from "the law" is one of the greatest freedoms... It is not that we do not need the law but do we need the law bombarded at us at such a young and innocent age? That is the question.

Christians, in the first century, put a stop to the requirement that all children be educated in "the law"... this is freedom.

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spendius wrote:

Sanctus:-

How about when the religion entails human sacrifice?Many religions have that.Some,I gather,still do.
How about temple prostitution?
There's many other things too.I don't think your definition is workable.It includes freedom and non-freedom at the same time.Its a bit rhetorical to say the least.

spendius.

I get where you're going; but it's very hard to describe what I am talking about. Pretty much modern-day America, without such religious and bias undertones.

Sanctuary wrote:

Freedom is having some laws...individual religion, opinions, and reasonings - yet having government. I think laws/rules are essential to living somewhat peacefully, at least compared to life without rules for everyone.

Itallics: referring to communism & anarchy. Neither would ever work, or do, in reality. People are suppressed or unprotected - or both.

The mixture of laws and freedom is hard to explain, I know, but don't view it as a concept - actually think about what I mean. Some laws, yes - as people will be punished for murder. But freedom as well, as in I can be a Buddhist, you can be Jewish, that guy to your right there can be Hindu and that lady up there is a Christian - and we're all welcomed here.

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RexRed

To me, freedom is the possibility of choice between different alternatives.But to reach that freedom we must have the possibility of develop our personality in order to be able to choose. That is the role of education (in school and at home).
Real freedom is the possibility of making rational choices.
If someone, in a presidencial election, chooses a candidate because of her beauty, and rejects another because of his skin colour, the choice is irrational. Not free. Irrational because beauty or colour of skin are not the criteria for that specific choice.

Freedom begins in education. In culture, because real culture teach us how to think critically, how to doubt, how to create, analyse and accept or reject reasons to our choices.

Spendius is wrong. Anarchy is the absolute absence of freedom.

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val wrote:

RexRed

To me, freedom is the possibility of choice between different alternatives.But to reach that freedom we must have the possibility of develop our personality in order to be able to choose. That is the role of education (in school and at home).
Real freedom is the possibility of making rational choices.
If someone, in a presidencial election, chooses a candidate because of her beauty, and rejects another because of his skin colour, the choice is irrational. Not free. Irrational because beauty or colour of skin are not the criteria for that specific choice.

Freedom begins in education. In culture, because real culture teach us how to think critically, how to doubt, how to create, analyse and accept or reject reasons to our choices.

Spendius is wrong. Anarchy is the absolute absence of freedom.

I agree with what you say... but I do not think it is as clear cut, or an either or thing.

Anarchists do not seem to care about the freedom of others... only their own. Anarchism is a selfish freedom... also "freedom" can contain so many choices that by nature it corrupts. With choice comes the need for tolerance. The more choice we have the more tolerance that is required to accept the choices of others. The more choices we have the more we are likely to become distracted by a lack of basic standards.

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Freedom is free from oppression.

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Ray

In part, freedom is to be free from opression.
But freedom is also to be free for ... not only from.
To be free in order to choose.
I remind you that opression is not only to be put in jail or killed because of our opinions. Is also in the education, in the social manipulation, molding global opinions, making us a-critical citizens.

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Ray wrote:

Freedom is free from oppression.

Ray

I beg your pardon but that is a bit vague... It depends on the alternative to oppression. It also depends on the source, type and outcome of oppression. Life in general is oppression. The physical body constrains us to this mortal world, we are oppressed by our placement and to this seemingly temporal existence... but isn't it grand?

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val wrote:

Ray

In part, freedom is to be free from opression.
But freedom is also to be free for ... not only from.
To be free in order to choose.
I remind you that opression is not only to be put in jail or killed because of our opinions. Is also in the education, in the social manipulation, molding global opinions, making us a-critical citizens.

Val

To promote so much choice is implying that all people innately have the ability to discern the correct or most viable choices for their lives. We witness in society people making grave outrageous errors in judgment every day. These people are not stupid people who make these errors. They are often highly educated people... the prisons are full of them. They have been taught right from wrong... yet they are driven by some "corrupted" nature within. Their right to freedom becomes wrong...

This nature draws them from what is by most people considered "best" behavior. It consumes their logic and then their freedom becomes the very thing that brings about their own demise. What makes choice in itself better than just simple obedience to the "best" choice? If there was a single all knowing guide...

There are different types of things people can become educated with. Morality seems to be the hardest thing to teach. When we know the reasons for that we will understand a greater part of the psyche of the human will. Are we creatures of habit or is there a destiny to fulfill? How do we learn what is kept deep in the seat of our being? These are all the mysteries of how people choose to hide and keep secret their intents... We have role models and yet even these role models sometimes fail us.

Who is going to dictate morality? Who is going to draw the line on immorality when we are all most often affected by each others "choices"?

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RexRed

I didn't say that we have a kind of innately ability to discern the correct. What I meant was that education must teach us how to think. How to be critical, in the sense of being able to analyse our ideas, values, even to put them in question. Of course we do not always make the right choice. Emotional factors, false judgement, are frequently present.
But I think that the risk of making the worst choices increases with an education made to give you the answers, not the ability to question.
If you are raised in a very strict education system and learn that all that is not christian (or muslem, or white skinned, or black skinned, or male, or female) is bad, the chances you make the worst choices - terrorism, racial hate, murder, cruelty - are greater than if you are raised in a culture that allows you to analyse the basis of your beliefs and criteria.

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val wrote:

RexRed

I didn't say that we have a kind of innately ability to discern the correct. What I meant was that education must teach us how to think. How to be critical, in the sense of being able to analyse our ideas, values, even to put them in question. Of course we do not always make the right choice. Emotional factors, false judgement, are frequently present.
But I think that the risk of making the worst choices increases with an education made to give you the answers, not the ability to question.
If you are raised in a very strict education system and learn that all that is not christian (or muslem, or white skinned, or black skinned, or male, or female) is bad, the chances you make the worst choices - terrorism, racial hate, murder, cruelty - are greater than if you are raised in a culture that allows you to analyse the basis of your beliefs and criteria.

Val

If I implied that you have a certain opinion or belief concerning a particular thing or subject, I am sorry. I really do not know you well enough to make such an insinuation.

Concerning "freedom"... I have been giving this allot of though the last few days. I really think that the word "freedom" has escaped my mind most of my life. I have thought about the meanings of many words but freedom is one that I have said and let slip by my tongue as if it is something I have fully comprehended.

In just scratching the surface of this word in this post suddenly I have a whole contingency of issues I am confronted with. The word freedom embodies the right to life and liberty. It also can become frivolous and be abused. I have this idea of wild abandon and freedom as, a lawless place... Suddenly freedom does not have this comfortable little perch in amongst the other words in my head but represents a cautious word that is spoken with much self deliberation and reserve.

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I have the ability to control my mind and my body. This is true freedom. Most of the chains that bind us are within our own mind. As are most of the "freedoms" we believe we possess. Freedoms, restrictions, government, laws and crime are all illusions that exist within our own mind. The only true laws that bind us are the laws of physics.

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What is freedom?

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