Responsible Freedom

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As a group of people, we Americans, love our freedom. We love our freedom so much that we insist that it take precedence over pretty much anything and everything else. We claim that it infringes our freedom to be asked to wear a mask during a public health crisis. We demand our freedom to buy and own as many guns as we could possibly desire. We contend that it is our freedom to use our religion as a basis to discriminate against others. In short we’ve decided that the only thing that truly matters is upholding our own individual sense of freedom.

Now don’t get me wrong, freedom is a good thing. Having an abundance of choices and the ability to freely choose from them is a benefit that not many people have historically had. The freedom to choose your career, your spouse, your religion, your hobbies, the city you live in, the clothes you wear, the food you eat, the music you listen to… none of this is bad. It’s one of the things that has in fact made America great! I don’t think most Americans can even truly perceive of a country that severely limits the freedom of choice that we consistently take for granted. And yet, something is not quite right. We demand our freedom even when our freedom might be detrimental to our neighbors, to our society, even to ourselves. We become so enamoured by this idea of freedom, that we start to believe that we should be able to do whatever we want, whenever we want, with absolutely no accountability and definitely no responsibility whatsoever. We fully expect that our own individual freedom should outweigh anyone else’s individual freedom. But obviously this position is untenable. My freedom cannot be more important than yours and vice versa: we both live in America, we both love our freedom, we both cannot win when pitting our freedoms against each other. So what do we do?

Our democracy is based on equality, which in turn is what has provided us the ability to live our lives so freely. For example, if our country had been founded with a state sponsored religion that persecuted/discriminated against people practicing any other religion, then there would be no equality between people of different religions, which in turn would severely limit the ability of the populace to have the freedom to choose their own religious beliefs. And you may think, well my religion wouldn’t discriminate or persecute others so who cares, but what if your religion was not the government approved one. Somebody else’s freedom outweighed yours and now your religion is the disfavoured one. Would you be ok being persecuted? Would you be fine with being constantly discriminated against because your religion wasn’t the “right” one? Would you accept the continual harassment to change your religion to the “right” one? Would this still feel like you had the absolute freedom to choose and practice your own religion?

To protect our freedom we have to realize that our freedoms must be kept in balance with others’ freedoms and thus, we must fully support equality. To only support your own freedoms will eventually lead to the deterioration of our free society. This may seem inconceivable right now, but you have to remember that even though your freedoms may be favoured right now, there is no guarantee that they always will be. As soon as someone’s freedoms are allowed to outweigh everyone else’s, then society becomes less equal and everyone’s freedoms will diminish.

So how do we protect our freedoms? We must be responsible with them. And how can you be responsible with them? You have to weigh your personal freedom against the freedoms of others until there is balance. For example, the requirement to wear a mask in public spaces during a health crisis. Yes, you may find it uncomfortable, irritating, unattractive, but it really is a minor inconvenience that could potentially save the lives of countless others. A minor personal inconvenience should not outweigh the public health concern, especially as the minor inconvenience is equally applicable to all and is as much a measure designed to keep you safe as it is to keep others safe. If your personal health situation would be exasperated by the germs being spread by someone else, would you really choose someone else’s freedom to infect you over your own freedom to be safe from infection? Or take another example with the right to own guns. Guns are dangerous weapons. They can be used to kill innocent people. Having general safety requirements, like background checks, required gun safety courses, registration databases, etc are all protections designed to balance your freedom to own a gun, with someone’s else’s freedom to not be shot by someone who doesn’t have the necessary responsibility to own a gun. Most gun regulations are minor personal inconveniences that are worth the public health and safety benefits that would be derived from them. Your freedom to responsibly own a gun should be balanced with my freedom to not constantly worry about being shot by someone who shouldn’t have been able to get a gun in the first place.

Just as with anything else, when your or my freedom impacts others, then there is a necessity to balance the differing interests. We live in a society made up of numerous other people. In order for our society to function and not descend into chaos, we must realize that we cannot do everything that we want without limit. We must work together and balance each of our individual interests. We must use our freedom responsibly, otherwise we run the risk of losing it.