Let me first state that these are my personal opinions about freedom and certain ideologies, and that any acid remarks are directed at the latter and not persons adhering to them. They might be wrong and to some they certainly are.
Society and humans basically bad.
This is the essence of why I think some of the more popular cults have gotten it all wrong.
"Let's celebrate mediocricy! Let's build temples for our flaws! Let's remove our responsibility and yes, let us wallow in our failures! We're miserable creatures and soon we will all die and then the Sky Daddy will come spank us/reward us depending on what mood he's in".
Seriously, this life denying roadkill has gotta stop somewhere, but I wonder if some doomsday cults, however large they might be, are capable of this when their basic tenet is that we all suck, and we're all being punished because someone else sucked and screwed up.
Human society, as a whole, is a quite robust thing that has arisen through countless years of refinements, advancements and setbacks. However we humans came to be, be it a product of primordial soup that has undergone some serious evolution or the result of an odd deity that first creates one man outta nothing, then removes one of his ribs to create something for him to play around and breed with, we are unique creaturs.
Our capacity to hate and destroy is only rivalled by our capacity to love and create. A good friend of mine said to me while I was going through a period of clinical depression: "You never get what you deserve. You get what you expect", i.e that it is largely the mindset that shapes the result, and it's what one has one is to focus. Improvement, not beratement. Encouragment, not self pity. Belief in self, not denial of self.
I am free from sins, and in my hand I have a large rock. I'm ready to do damage, and I'm ready to do good.
Man, to me, is not more inherently evil and flawed than a coala bear or a wolf; a toad, nurse shark and parrot are the same as man in this regard. Man is unique in the animal kingdom; just as any other species is. Our intelligence sets us apart from other species, much like the speed of a cheetah sets it apart from others. We excel at intelligence and with that intelligence comes capability at a scale the world probably hasn't witnessed before.
Capability, freedom and responsibility are interlinked to such a degree that it is impossible to separate them Without the capability to grasp the latter two concepts, they are not. Freedom is impossible without responsibility, and a responsibility is a direct logical product of freedom. My reasoning behind this rests on Kant's Categorical Imperative. Flawed as it might be, it has its uses and places where it is applicable, at least to my mind.
I differentiate between the absolute and the actual; I have yet to see something exist absolutely when we talk concepts like this. What is freedom? Exemption from the power and control of another? I have that, with some limitations; I *am* dependent of others. There's too many of us for us to be able to live as hermits in cottages. Exemption from necessity? In this regard, I am not free. I must eat, I must dispose of my waste products. I must live and I must die.
Is freedom a mind thing, or a physical matter? Who is more free; the enslaved man who consider himself free, or the man born free who consider himself enslaved? It is conceivable that to most it is a combination of both.
Freedom to me can be as simple as doing my thing after doing or while doing what I have to, or as complicated as an absolute abstract ideal firmly placed on a high mental conscious level. Quite frankly, I dunno. Some days I think I feel the essence and aliveness of freedom; others I am incapable of producing one thought or emotion about freedom. Sort of like a fragrance long forgotten; when you smell it, you remember it.
It's a complex matter which is about doing whatever you want as long as it does not hurt others. Of course, there's great discussions about just when you hurt others and this is the basic source of the complexity. In a group as big as the human race and with the capabilities and characteristics of the same, it is natural for some kind of hierarchy to develop and for there to be made rules; compromises made where slices of freedom are being exchanged for security. A realistic pragmatist can appreciate it; for the idealist, the world is more black and white. What drives the world I would argue is the ureasonable realistic idealistic pragmatist, but that's another story.
With this background, I must say that I personally am actually free, but in the absolute sense, I am completely imprisoned, opressed and laid in chains.
Being a humanist, I have great hopes for humanity. I think most are pretty ok people with great potential for good and bad, and we can only get the former with education and responsibility. We've proven ourselves to be capable of varying degrees of objectivity and some have realized that humans are all the same, and what sets us apart is the cultural conditioning we're subjected to. Post modernists accuse me of being a result of the Western philosophy paradigm, which I readily admit is true.
Naturally, freedom includes the freedom to think we're wicked, sinful creatures who are failures yet somehow the cream of the crop of a deity's creation but to me, this fatalistic pessimistic defeatist attitude is a source of more griveance rather an attempt at improvement.
Dinner time soon. I wonder what's for breakfast? After that, I'll probably do some good things by myself. Or some bad things, haven't decided yet. All by my own power. To me, it is so simple yet so mindboggingly complex. Fascinating, really. Think I'll just do stuff and see what happens.
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StSanta
JG54 "Grünherz"
"If you died a stones throw from your wingie; you did no wrong". - Hangtime
