Significant Pursuit by Renaissance Guy

     I have come to realize that some of my discussions here and on other blogs relate strongly to the concept of freedom.  The concept of freedom is very important to me, and it underlies a lot of what I believe about everything else.

           People can never be absolutely free.  No matter what, we are somewhat enslaved by our brain chemistry, our physical condition, and our surroundings.  We can never fully escape our own thoughts or feelings.  We are harangued by our conscience and pursued, I believe, by God,  whom Francis Thompson called the “Hound of Heaven”.  This inability to be totally, absolutely free bothers some people, but we must make peace with it (or simply ignore it).

         It is self-evident, as Natural Law adherents like to say, that people should be free.  They should, by virtue of their individual identity, be free to pursue their own goals in their own way, as long as they do not stop anyone else from doing so.  Therein lie so many of the squabbles among people:  we want to impose our goals on others or interfere with their pursuit.  Even when people are not intending to oppose us, we can get very peeved if we think that they are trying to trample on our freedom.  It sounds like I’m talking more about rights than freedom, but they go hand-in-hand.

         Thinking now about government, we have seen in modern times a trend toward less administrative control and more personal, individual freedom.  Starting in 1215 with the Magna Carta, the Western World has evolved the concepts of constitutional republicanism and, in its general sense, democracy.  During the time that the idea of less government and more individualism has arisen and spread, folks have felt compelled to go back to a system that concentrates power in the hands of a few and denies freedom to the “common people.”  I understand why it appeals to the power-holders, but I don’t understand why so many people acquiesce in it.  (Of course, they don’t always acquiesce forever, as the fall of the Soviet regime shows.)

         Western Europe and Canada have been moving backwards, in respect to freedom, for some time now.  They have taken measures to confiscate increasing amounts of people’s wealth, to criminalize speech, to burden the economic market with excessive regulations and fees, to totally control some sectors of the economy, and to micromanage how people care for themselves and their families.  The United States of America has been moving in the same direction but at a slower rate.  Some of our current candidates for president would “step on the gas” and help us catch up with our neighbors across the Atlantic and to the north.  Why do so many people want to go back to a Feudalisticsystem in which the Lord of the Manor lives off the labor of the peasants and throws them back a few crumbs or to an Imperialistic system in which the Emperor gives us bread and circuses?

     One reason for the shift toward Statism and Collectivism is the underlying, and sometimes unconscious, conception of the nation as a great family (as in Tribalism) with the government officials as parents.  (George Orwell perceptively wrote about Big Brother.)  It’s comforting to have a family to take care of you, isn’t it?  The trouble with seeing the government that way is that it allows the government to override the sovereignty of the actual family units and it creates a situation in which adults, who see themselves anoninted for the purpose, are parenting other adults.  In a real family, the parents eventually give the children freedom to live their own lives and pursue their own goals.  In the “Nanny State” people are perpetually under the thumb of the government; the only way to “grow up” is to become one of the enlightened members of the ruling party.    

     A final thought!  As I write this, I don’t know if anyone will read it, so I don’t want to extend it any further.  I just want to say, as I have been wont to say before, that I like freedom and want to preserve and restore it in my country.