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I know I've mentioned this before but with this year being a political upset between the Brexit and the US elections I thought it was a good time to bring this up again.

Currently in the West we sort our politics according to 'left' and 'right' and anymore those old labels are meaningless as politicians lean authoritarian no matter who they are...even the Libertarians this year are pulling on their jackboots.

So instead of left/right how about Free/Not Free.

This gives us a spectrum that looks more like this:

Free ------------------ Less Free ----------------- Not Free

Laws would be viewed along this spectrum, too. Do they make you more or less free?

Law enforcement should especially be viewed this way: Do they make you more or less free?

Do political candidates support more freedom or do they oppose freedom?

It's a suggestion because the old way of looking at things just isn't working anymore.

   

As long as it is x vs y, nothing changes.

For your particular example, one persons freedom can be another persons imprisonment. Think something as simple as free speech, and add in racism. Many, in Canada, find that the inability for persons to promote racism extremely liberating, even freedom-esque. Allowing persons to promote racism would invoke the opposite, feeling diminished, even imprisoned.

I don't know what an ideal solution is, but I do think that it will be found in a more collaborative approach.

   

I agree with the whole left vs right labels as being rather meaningless. I find those labels too vague.

Free vs not free... unsure about the usage of those terms. "Not free" at its extreme to me would be akin to living under a dictatorship/communism, very limited choices in almost everything to do with everyday living. "Free" at its extreme is probably unattainable nowadays, nice theory though.

As far as laws go it seems that in order to protect freedom one must give up other freedoms to make it happen.

   

I hate all those labels.... I don't even try to label myself.

   

I suppose I should clarify that I mean to say Individual Freedom when I say freedom. I do not subscribe to the bullshit notions of collective rights at the expense of the individual.

Meaning that I prize your right to be a racist over someone else's desire that force be used against you because of your personal beliefs.

So long as your personal beliefs or words do not deprive someone else of their actual liberty then no one has a right to restrain you.

You have a right to speak and everyone else has the right to ignore you.

I personally don't care if you're reciting The Aristocrats no one else has the right to silence you in a public forum.

I also don't give a fuck about specious claims of how someone 'feels' when someone else speaks their mind.

And 'freedom-esque' is not freedom. It's especially not freedom when the arbiters of acceptable thought and acceptable speech determine that your anti-racist thoughts and speech constitute a violation of law...which was the case in both of our countries in the not-so-distant past.

We cannot trade one repression for another without creating repression.

That said, calls to violence which result in violence should be considered violence. And by 'violence' I do not mean that some pussy-fied Millennial wet themselves over a mere opinion but that someone got beaten or killed because someone else agitated for violence.

If you think that freedom means being free from ideas and opinions that you don't like then I hope you won't mind when that 'freedom' is used to justify putting you in a prison someday. Lots of Soviets learned about that kind of freedom the hard way.

   

Horseshoe theory is garbage. Where do anarcho-communists fall? Proponents of this theory either deny their existence, bend themselves backwards to imply they're the same as fascists, or somehow take a hit to their ideology by allowing anarcho-communists to sit next to the anarcho-capitalists at the table. Why is the only marker for freedom in this garbage theory seem to be how free the rich are to do what they please in this world?

Even if there was any slight validity in such a scale, it has no nuance. Are anarcho-communists and anarcho-capitalists friends in the fight for freedom? No. Anarcho-communists are revolutionary allies with Anarchists and Communists against capitalism and exploitation. Yet these groups supposedly occupy vastly different spots on your scale. Even though they want the same thing ("full communism"), have the same social and economic views for the vast majority of things, and only differ in their view of government's role in the revolution.

Far too little information can be obtained from such a scale. That makes it low quality in my opinion. But mainly because it's just another right-wing propagandist circlejerk to try and group communists with fascists while precious anarcho-capitalists use it to claim they're the best best bestest guys cause "freedom".

   

Why does your definition of freedom supersede mine?

This why x vs y doesn't work. The eventual outcome is the same regardless of title. Polarization to the point of cessation.

That being said, are you really shocked by getting an answer that wasn't Americana, on a primarily Canadian site?

   

Cause baby, I'm an anarchist,
You're a spineless liberal.
We marched together for the eight-hour day
And held hands in the streets of Seattle,
But when it came time to throw bricks
Through that Starbucks window,
You left me all alone
All alone.

Against Me! - Baby, I'm an Anarchist

   

My Dad once put it differently


Totalitarianism -------------------------------------------------------------Anarchy

   

Because if it didn't I'd have to kill you for hurting my feelings.

   

This genuinely made me laugh, which was much needed today.

Thank you.

   

Your Dad is nicer than mine his was

My way ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hiway


We don't talk politics any more it just upsets him that I take the hiway every time

   

Question for clarification...

Are you referring to "positive liberty" as well, or simply "negative liberty"?

Positive liberty, as I understand it, is that type of liberty, often supported by government programs, charities, etc. that give people more opportunity to actually exercise their liberties than they might otherwise lack because of their life circumstances.

A kid might be a genius composer or a brilliant architect, but his household is dirt poor. Under those circumstances, it's not clear how much chance he really has to exercise his freedoms. Public education gives him more of a chance to develop his innate skills, and provides him with more of an opportunity to exercise his liberties to say what he wants, work to earn a higher income, and make the most of his abilities.

Or, a guy is gainfully employed but seriously injured on the job, and his family's income takes a huge hit, how much of a chance do they have to exercise their liberties? A social safety net allows the family to continue participating in the economy and puts less of a strain on their income, when they might otherwise end up in the poorhouse through no fault of their own due simply to bad luck.

That's the thing-shit happens in real life, and people suffer through no fault of their own. Government action and other things obviously can't cover all of this, but they can still act as a means for people to continue enjoying agency and the ability to exercise their talents and liberties.

There need to be limits, obviously, but when it's applied right government action can still be useful and helpful. I disagree with the idea that it has to be an all-or-nothing proposition, where we either live in a Marxist dystopia or a Dickensian free-for-all.

   

so often the people who espouse the negative freedom you talk about, turn out to have their noses as deep in the trough as anybody else, maybe more.

   

I agree.

But there needs to be a real balance between the government power that takes from one person to give to another and the right of the first person to be free to enjoy what is theirs.

The absurd extension of government taking from people in order to provide for others is seen in the hideously abusive asset forfeiture laws in the USA where you can have your money seized by the police simply because you had money...not because you'd committed an actual crime.

Government should be protecting people from theft, not orchestrating it.

   

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