freedom!!!!!

Do governments give or restrict the freedom we have?

Very dull topic if you asked me, sorry!

anyways, as is obvious they do both, but different governments rock on different levels of freedom and restrictions as regards different issues.

i hate you…

:laughing: LOL :laughing: ,

  • when I read these three posts, it was like I could see you guys in front of each other arguing, it’s very comedic how CBA left it at “I hate you…” - I really am not sure whether he meant it or was joking around, but what a way to end a thread!

What’s your take?

:stuck_out_tongue: I didn’t mean it.

Im sorry magius i have to ask him, i cant resist. dont get me wrong.
:wink:

CBA Is that your final take? :stuck_out_tongue:

I hate this thread… :imp:

At least they aren’t ristricting your freedom to say such things… and you started the stupid thread anyway… love it! :smiley:

As I was reading the follow-up posts, and finished laughing, I realized that we will most likely be told to move this thread to the mundane babble forum, since it has nothing to do with politics or economics. But the ironic thing is, I later realized, that the thread is called ‘freedom!!!’ and that what we are talking about here is the act of freedom, since we are not saying anything really, just rambling - but we are doing because we feel ‘free’ to do it. So it comes back and actually does have to do with the thread.

Ciao,

Hmmmm, is that freedom though? Is rambling really a sign of feeling free or of something else? I have no idea if this is true, but Pak Chung Hee, the former dictator of South Korea, is reported to have said that a drunk populace is a populace that doesn’t rebel. The primary alcohol (soju) here is indeed cheap so, yes, we have the freedom to drink but is drunken rambling a sign of freedom or of manipulation? Why would any dictator squash rambling as such? After all, it diverts some energy from the possibility of coherent resistance. I’m not against rambling, obviously I do it all the time, but if rambling is a sign of freedom, doesn’t freedom lose something? When rambling begins to dominate, at another place I called this the tyranny of frivolity, haven’t we become the people at the market place ignoring the madman who screams, “Freedom is dead!”?

Or something like that.

My original thought was that it denys freedom. That we are born totally free and that it then works on from there to deny us of some rights so we can live totally happy. Or atleast happier than we would be under the laws of nature. But later I decided it was more of a glass half empty half full type discussion and decided to let it die.

I probably should’ve posted that earlier…

Fair enough. But I was wondering if we couldn’t tease out the meaning of freedom a bit more. What does it mean to be free, what are the presuppositions and so forth? At another site, after a particularly loud display of American patriotism, someone wrote, “We really are freedom!” and I thought, “What the hell does that mean?” It’s such an important word for most of us, I think we should discuss it, not simply accept it.

Brad,
your suggestion on where to take freedom is leading into an already existing thread called ‘Free will vs determinism’.

Furthermore, Brad stated:

No. Doesn’t matter what act you are doing, freedom is doing something for the sake of itself without being brought to doing that - but by choosing it yourself without anything having brought you to do it, one may argue the same for virtue. What is so wrong about rambling?

Brad stated:

No. Why do you think so? My personal view is a mixture of determinism and free will. This world loves this opposite pole strategy, it’s gotta be one way or another. It can’t be inbetween or it can’t be something that didn’t take three seconds to think about. People are always hyping up freedom, other’s hype up determinism. It’s rare to hear someone have a view of both.

What’s your take?

I see the free will v. determinism as mired in metaphysics and though I try to shift it, it doesn’t seem like I’m doing a very good job. Also, I think we can make a distinction between free will and freedom.

There’s nothing wrong with rambling except that it’s easy and tends to put pressure on others to ramble as well. It’s hard to get your point across above the din of nothingness so to speak. Rambling a splendid tool for political control if you think about it.

I don’t think determinism is important for freedom (it answers a different question), but rambling or ‘just doing what you want as long as it doesn’t hurt somebody else’ isn’t necessarily a good yardstick for freedom. Freedom means the ability to disagree in the political arena (broadly defined) without getting killed or imprisoned or it doesn’t mean anything important. When it’s extended to mean something like the ‘right to party’ , it becomes trivial. Freedom is something you exercise, it isn’t something you’re endowed with. If you don’t exercise it, then there’s no way to tell if you have it. That is, you can ramble all you want when it’s not important, but freedom only really matters when it’s important? Rambling can make it difficult to distinguish between the important and the trivial.

In answer to CBA’s first question -

The purpose of a good government is to neither give nor restrict freedom. In my judgement, the purpose of good government is to provide physical force in the protection of freedom.

An example of such good government would be the fist I threw at the school bully the other day because he demanded my milk money or else… I was the governing party in this example, and man, I made good government; you should see his black eye. I was able to protect my freedom to own.

Brian,
good for you! I hope I have satisfied the desire you came to get here. If you think that giving a black eye to each person who demands something you wish not to give is some kind of a good answer, so good that you would come on a message board to boast your ego to be some kind of rationalization related to Government, well you got something to learn. What exact rationalization did it take to punch him? He ordered you to give him your milk money, your anger and emotions rose until you couldn’t take it anymore and you punched him - maybe you would like a trophy. With that trophy you could grow up to be a tyrant, maybe an extremist religious believer who goes around shooting everyone else in the name of your belief in whatever God you choose or political system you condone. Maybe after you have killed off everyone on the planet you can sit on what is the last rock in a thoughtful position like Michealangelo and tell yourself “I was right”.

I do agree with standing up for yourself, but there were measures you could have taken prior to giving him a black eye. If you knew that you could defeat any other man in the world, would you not try to edify others of their ignorance and teach them a better way since punishing those who don’t know any better wouldn’t get you anywhere other then them doing as you wish because they fear, and not because they understand. Hence why communism fell. I myself have been taking martial arts most of my life, but I have not had to use it once. I have been in a total of about three fights that I can remember in my whole life. Am I big you ask? Nope. Do I have that crazy look about me that people just don’t want to mess with me? Nope. I am just your everyday looking guy. But I know how to deal with people…in a nice way. I had the pleasure of working with my closest friend at the same company. He told me one day that he is always awe struck at how I deal with customers. Till this day he doesn’t understand it, a customer would be yelling and swearing at the top of their lungs at him (manager) and one of our employees, I would enter the room and within 60 seconds the customer would be calm, but more importantly, satisfied their case has been heard and that something is being done about it. And I am not talking about kissing ass or being a slave to the customer, I’m talking about explaining to them my own position as well as entertaining what they must be going through in a respectable manner. I am one who does not believe in the “customer is always right” ideology. But I don’t have too. Why throw a punch if you know you can make the other person understand your position within seconds to the point of them even wanting to help you? I make more friends from negative situations then I do in good ones. Give Dale Carnegie a read to understand further what I am talking about.

What’s your take?

I don’t about the whole talking to people thing. I’ve been jumped and robbed and other things a couple times and tried talking my way out of it. It ended up me getting hurt or almost hurt. Some people deserve to be hit. Personally I don’t think trying to talk it out with someone that’s trying to rob you would work.

Not that I’m defending Brian here I’m just offering my opinion and experience with getting stuff taken from me :wink: .

Brian providing physical force to protect your “freedom” could be the same as providing physical force to make you do something you don’t agree with.

An analogy of what I was initially trying to ask is a cop arresting you. They read you your rights while putting hand cuffs on you. It’s on a different scale than living under a goverments rules but it’s the same idea. I don’t know how to explain it… That doesn’t make as much sense as I was hoping… o well