As an American, we grew up with a constant drumbeat telling us what a great country America is because it's so free and boasts so many freedoms. This is the ultimate example of a misconception: America, the land of the free. This phrase is completely meaningless. Ask an American what they mean by freedom. What do you mean by the freedom you have that others don’t? The average American citizen has less freedom than any random villager in Indonesia or Ghana or anywhere else in the Global South.
» What do you mean by the freedom you have that others don’t? «
What freedom are you even talking about? Most Americans are living paycheck to paycheck. For many, missing even one paycheck means being thrown out onto the street. That’s the reality. You don’t just have one master in America when it comes to your slavery. We talk about debt slavery, wage slavery, and so on. Your employer is your master. Your student loan officer is your master. Your landlord is your master. The credit card bureau is your master. Your mortgage loan officer is your master. Your insurance adjuster, your Health Maintenance Organization, the Internal Revenue Service, your credit card company—they are all your masters. In America, you are a slave with many masters, and they all have their chains on you, each with their own lash to use on your back. So what freedom do you have?
You have more laws and regulations in America than in any other country in the world. The average American's daily life is governed, influenced, restricted, or determined by tens of thousands of laws and regulations—upwards of 50,000 to 100,000 rules at the municipal, state, and federal levels—not to mention the rules imposed by your employer. Most of these rules exist under the pretense of making society better and protecting you, but the truth, known by any American who is paying attention, is that these rules exist primarily to generate revenue for the enforcing bodies through fines and fees. That’s the real purpose behind most of these regulations. It's not about health, safety, or security; it is just about making money off you.
And in this so-called great democratic country, you have no say in how any of that money is spent. You have no say in how the funds collected from you are utilized. So I ask again: what freedom do you really have? What freedom is so special and unique? Honestly, none. Zero. There are no freedoms you have in America, that are not available elsewhere. And there are freedoms elsewhere that you do not have in America. But they constantly tell you how free you are, implying that every other country is an oppressive tyranny where no one can do anything.
What freedom are you even talking about? Most Americans are living paycheck to paycheck. For many, missing even one paycheck means being thrown out onto the street. That’s the reality. You don’t just have one master in America when it comes to your slavery. We talk about debt slavery, wage slavery, and so on. Your employer is your master. Your student loan officer is your master. Your landlord is your master. The credit card bureau is your master. Your mortgage loan officer is your master. Your insurance adjuster, your Health Maintenance Organization, the Internal Revenue Service, your credit card company—they are all your masters. In America, you are a slave with many masters, and they all have their chains on you, each with their own lash to use on your back. So what freedom do you have?
» In America, you are a slave with many masters. «
You have more laws and regulations in America than in any other country in the world. The average American's daily life is governed, influenced, restricted, or determined by tens of thousands of laws and regulations—upwards of 50,000 to 100,000 rules at the municipal, state, and federal levels—not to mention the rules imposed by your employer. Most of these rules exist under the pretense of making society better and protecting you, but the truth, known by any American who is paying attention, is that these rules exist primarily to generate revenue for the enforcing bodies through fines and fees. That’s the real purpose behind most of these regulations. It's not about health, safety, or security; it is just about making money off you.
And in this so-called great democratic country, you have no say in how any of that money is spent. You have no say in how the funds collected from you are utilized. So I ask again: what freedom do you really have? What freedom is so special and unique? Honestly, none. Zero. There are no freedoms you have in America, that are not available elsewhere. And there are freedoms elsewhere that you do not have in America. But they constantly tell you how free you are, implying that every other country is an oppressive tyranny where no one can do anything.
Moreover, the overwhelming majority of Americans never leave the country, so they don’t even know what life is like anywhere else. Western civilization has never truly believed in freedom as the highest value. That’s the reality they don’t want you to know. It’s just part of the sales pitch to convince you how wonderful your society is. If you trace back to the alleged philosophical roots of Western civilization in ancient Greece, the philosophers they tout as inspiration—Aristotle, Plato—did not subscribe to this belief in unqualified freedom. The true foundation of Western thought has always been more authoritarian and classist than liberal and democratic. They prioritized order and the security of the status quo over liberty and freedom. They always believed in power being held by the elite. If you actually read these philosophers, whether they are Greek, Enlightenment thinkers, or the so-called founding fathers, you will see the lineage of thought behind the modern Western power structure. They sell the public an idea of freedom, but anyone with common sense knows that you can’t base an organized society solely on liberty and the so-called sovereignty of the individual.
Anyone who thinks about it for more than five seconds realizes this. How long would such a society even last? But the government and the power structure don’t even respect the population enough to tell you that. They don’t want you to understand the real system you live in. Instead, they tell you how free you are and indulge your fantasies because they perceive you as childlike. That’s why they don’t educate people properly. The level of idiocy imposed upon the public in America is astronomical. You might point to the freedom to criticize the government or to protest. But they only grant you the freedom to protest in a 'democracy' when they aren’t actually providing you with democracy. Think about it: why would you need to go out into the streets to demand change if you have a functioning democracy? If political mechanisms exist to meet your demands, why protest? Because your government ignores you. That’s why. Your freedom to protest and to criticize the government just means you have the freedom not to be listened to. In fact, democracies have perfected the exclusion of the population from policy-making decisions. The entire democratic mechanism is designed to marginalize the population.
» Anyone who thinks about it for more than five seconds realizes this. «
Right now, they have you focused on the election, thinking about who will win, who to vote for, or who to vote against, while real power is completely removed from that process. They have distracted you from where real power lies because they have convinced you how free and democratic your society is, which, in practical terms, means you have no power whatsoever. You have no voice. That is why it doesn’t matter when you protest in the street; it matters no more than casting a vote in a ballot box. Both actions hold equal significance regarding policy outcomes. It starts from the misconception that your so-called civilization ever believed in freedom, liberty, and democracy. Those who rule over you never believed in that for a moment. What you have is the system they intended you to have—a system where power is held by the elite and the population is completely disempowered.
What a spectacle.