Sunday, April 28, 2019

Personal Freedom, My Guide and Compass

I self-identify as a human being, American, politically Conservative, Christian, heterosexual male who respects your right to do whatever you damn well please so long as your desire to do whatever you damn well please does not infringe or impede my right to do whatever I damn well please or the rights of others to do whatever they damn well please!

That is the foundation principle [personal freedom] for the establishment of The United States of America. It is the core of the Declaration of Independence and was the seminal and innovative principle governing the debate about and writing of the Constitution of The United States.
Personal freedom for myself and everyone else and all that phrase implies dictates my thoughts, politics, writings, worldview, and faith.

 While most of the Founders were men of religious faith, many were not. However, they all recognized that the rights of personal freedom were part of "Natural Law" and are independent of a personal belief in God. Thomas Jefferson was very careful to state in the Declaration that "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

 Jefferson's use of the word "Creator" was intentional. It leaves open the interpretation as "God" for those who believe in God and Nature for those that do not.

Some people say that freedom means, not necessarily "free to do whatever you damn well please," but rather to do what you ought to do. I take issue with that interpretation. "Ought" must be defined by someone. That definition requires some human to determine what some other human "Ought" to do. That is very democrat and even socialist.
Liberty and freedom means doing whatever you damn well please so long as it does not infringe on someone else. Otherwise, some other person is making your decisions and that is anathema to liberty and freedom.

 You do not get to decide what I ought to do.

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3 comments:

  1. AnonymousSeptember 22, 2026 at 1:32 PM

    This is absolutely brilliant the way you word this in such an easily digestable way. (Except I had to look up the word "anathema"!)

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  2. AnonymousSeptember 22, 2026 at 1:44 PM

    DeAnn here:
    One thing I got to thinking about is the part you wrote about decisions being made for you.... I'm afraid that it may be APPEALING to some of these very young people - who live on their phones, and therefor did not develop the needed social skills that make having choices fun and exciting. Instead, we have a majority (or close, at least) of youth who don't want to ask for ketchup at McDonal's or take a phone call due to social anxiety and all the underdeveloped social skills. So my fear is that pre-made decisions and a lack of needing to interact and/or make a decision is actually APPEALING to them. I'm not sure, of course. Just an observatiin about behavior patterns and a hypithesis about where it could lead.

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