The word Liberty
gets thrown around regularly these days. This is, of course, because Liberty is being destroyed
now at a faster pace and more thoroughly than at any time in the history of
mankind. Technology has given tyrants of today unprecedented ability to enslave
people. But do you even really know what Liberty
means? What is the essence of Liberty?
It isn’t the ability to vote for “the lesser of 2 evils” every four years.
“Liberty
is the control of one’s actions free from the arbitrary will or coercion of
another.”
It is a personal and individual quality, just as individual
rights are. It isn’t a collective trait of a group of people. It follows then
that Liberty
can only be asserted at an individual level. No one can give you Liberty, it is inherent
to humankind. It isn’t something created or granted by a declaration or
constitution. Every person is born with the desire to assert their will.
No one can “fight” for your Liberty. The common notion that someone else
can “fight for our liberty” is simply illogical. Since every person must assert
their Liberty
for themselves, the only thing another can do for them is protect them from the
consequences of that assertion.
.
Unfortunately the responsibility of exercising one’s own
freedom has been divorced from the inseparable responsibility of accepting the consequences
of that exercise. But the fact remains that no one can take away your Liberty unless you agree
to give it up.
Living in a tyrannical condition, it is often “unlawful” to criticize
the tyranny. But freedom is constrained only
if the people are compliant. If one person speaks or acts out they will likely suffer
grave consequences. This is the true price of freedom. If all the people speak
out, the tyrant loses the power to constrain freedom. The true hero’s are the
ones who stand up first for Liberty.
The more people that stand for freedom, the easier it becomes for the
remainder. But with each successive wave of free people, the farther they are
removed from the reality of the cost of their freedom.
I believe the founders of the United States implicitly understood
this. They pledged their very lives and fortunes on the acts of exercising
their Liberty. They
didn’t fight for a flag, or a tradition, they fought for “control of their actions free from the arbitrary will or coercion
of another’ – Specifically King George and British bureaucracy. Many of them
did indeed lose their lives. Did they purchase or guarantee freedom for you?
No, they removed the forces that constrained their freedom in their time. But
there are never ending threats to Liberty and it
is our responsibility to take action against the enemies of Liberty for our time, at an individual level,
regardless of the cost. The longer we wait, the more difficult the struggle
will be.
