Right off the bat, I'm getting really sick of this word as well as 'freedom'. To make this clear because I know someone will still bring it up and I'll have to redirect them here, I'm not hating on the meaning of the words, I'm hating on the words themselves and how ridiculously overused and misunderstood they are. Now, this thread applies mostly to US citizens since I think our foreign brethren may have a harder time grasping how truly annoying it is to hear these words tossed around so frequently with such little meaning, but I think this sort of frustration can be applied to any term with a heavy meaning that gets overused. Such as "love". In the US, whenever some people feel threatened by the government, new laws, legislation or toppings they didn't want on their pizza, the words "liberty" and "freedom" are bound to show up. Even if they have no bearing on the situation, those words are fire-starters and people know this. It's why they're used. What better why to rile people up than to start ranting about the death of freedom or the loss of liberty? People are easy to stir and easy to convince and using such words just helps grease the wheels so to say. It also has a truly negative effect because the continued usage of the term diminishes its meaning and for two words that should be very important to us, they've become incredibly dull and sterile. What are your thoughts? Do you think they're overused? Can you see the possibility of a negative effect of overusing them?
Sure we know the meaning of those words, but 99% of the US population doesn't know what it "feels" like. Being born into "Freedom" and "Liberty", we take it for granted and throw it around like any other word. We don't know what its like to not be allowed to have the "Liberty" to publicily denounce government and big business and the president and be entirely unconcerned about retaliation. We don't know what its like to not have the "Freedom" to do essentially whatever the hell you want with your life short of murdering and robbing. I do believe it will become cliche and lose its true meaning and "feeling" the further we get from our founding values as a country.
Alright, this probably annoys me more than teabaggers shouting about Obama taking away their "freedom." Has everyone forgotten that most of the "founders" owned slaves? As in, they oppressed other people? Who do you think built the Capitol? Sure as hell wasn't the white land owners. The US even fought a war with itself to continue said human rights violations when the rest of the western world had just passed a couple of laws to outlaw it. These mystical "founders" I keep hearing about were not gods, and certainly did not give the slightest fuck about the freedom of 21st century people.
Liberty and freedom have been under attack for generations. Know-it-all "progressives" and leftists see government as their opportunity to force others to live their lives as they dictate. The US Constitution is supposed to limit the federal government to enumerated powers, but those on the left like to "interpret" rules so in the end they can rationalize anything they desire. It is the ruling class and their useful idiots that empower and embolden the federal government to continue their encroachment of individual liberty and freedom. ------ Here is an example of one of the ruling class elites telling the country class that the federal government can do whatever it desires to them: Breitbart.tv Congressman at Town Hall: ‘The Federal Government Can Do Most Anything in This Country’
I know you say this is for Americans mostly, but what I put to bold you said I think is untrue. I think most foreign people to the USA tire of the use from America as well. We see "America bring liberty and freedom to Iraq, Afghanistan etc... " But many feel this is not so, including many Iraqi or Afghan people. It is much like Estonia who's people fought Russian rule for decades only to now be pressured by the US to do as they say in the world. Estonia needs NATO to assure we do not fall to Russian rule once again, and the US uses this "carrot" to get whatever they ask of us. Is this freedom? liberty? to me it is blackmail, but this is the true meaning of liberty and freedom from America to us.
