Honzo May 22nd, 2005

Freedom is a hard thing to understand. The most basic principal is
quite simplistic and historically, novel. The outworking of the
principal of freedom is not nearly as simplistic.

Most simply put, freedom is choice. The “choice to do X” is the “Freedom of X.”

Enter government:
If the government makes choices for you, then it limits one’s choice
and therefore one is not free. If it leaves more and more choices to
the person, then it is freer, it has a higher standard of liberty. Now
here is where it gets tricky.

It is easy to live within a structure. I am darn good at it. Take me
out of that structure, then I can revert to laziness, lack focus, shift
priorities; as a result, I screw up. Sometimes I long for that
structure, those walls that allow me to have security and advance my
goals. Choice for me would be limited. Sometimes I would give up my
choice for security.

I am less free. Am I less of a person? If one voluntarily gives up
their choice, are they limiting themselves? Does choice create part of
a person? Does it flesh out aspects of their personality? I am quite
sure that it does in their mind. If I am a blindly believing Christian
(Jew, Muslim, Hindu, atheist, etcetera) and I never question or think
about why I believe and act the way I do, I am less developed,
mentally, emotionally, and personality-wise, than a person who has.

Now, clearly a self governing person is more “fit” than a person
governed by outside forces - religion, political structures, and
etcetera. Therein lies the hard part: Becoming a self governing person.
Many don’t want to be. I friend of mine at work is from Ireland and
tells me that many in Europe want to go back to the structure of the
Soviet Union. They have that same wish that I have from time to time of
living in monkey bars.

I am terrible at self governing. I know people that have exceptional
abilities and when they are given complete freedom they are just like
me - they revert to laziness, lack focus, shifting priorities and seem
to flounder - and yet these people have more ability than the people
around them.

What separates the people who make it in a free society from those
who don’t? - It seems to be discipline. What is discipline? It appears
to be the ability to establish goals, set a method of accomplishing
them, and then sticking to the methods through the easy and the hard
times.

How does one obtain this discipline? None are born with it. Few -
mostly those that are forced to (by poor circumstance) - learn it by
themselves. Usually it is grafted onto a person by structures. These
structures can be parents, school, government, or even military. Most
importantly, it is taught by a structure that limits choice and alters
the persons so that they can be given the power to govern their own
lives.

So, the only way for a society to be a largely self-governing one,
the members of that society must, at an early age, be given structure
by a structure so that they might be able live through the choices they
will be able to make in the future.

This seems to be a contradiction in principals: In order to have a
free society, the ideal of liberty must be momentarily suspended
involuntarily so that a good citizen can be created, one that can
effectively govern itself. Yet, if this ability to govern one’s self is
not given to a person, then the society will inevitably descend into
chaos and ultimately succumb to a ridged structure, either by a
demagogic dictator or by outside force. The void of discipline is a
vacuum - it seeks to be filled, it is a negative pressure.
I guess I want an educated, free society.

• Philosophy
• Comments(0)