There are some things we think are self-evident, such as
that we our endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights, such as
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (which includes owning property).
But a whole lot of what was obvious, or self-evident, up
until recently may not be so obvious today.
Here at the Spherical Model, we make the assumption that the
good things we’re going for are freedom, prosperity, and civilization—rather than
the alternatives of tyranny, poverty, and savagery. The choice seems obvious.
And yet there are many people who literally do not value
freedom. It may be that they’ve had it redefined out of existence, like so many
other truths. But I thought we might do a bit of awareness raising on freedom
today.
Here’s how I define terms, using my 1980 Webster’s
Dictionary combined with my words:
Freedom: absence of hindrance, restraint, confinement,
repression. In the political sense, it is ownership of one’s own life and the
production of wealth and property that results from one’s use of life and
effort. A government should protect the freedoms of life, liberty, and
property; it does not grant these things, but protects them from infringement.
A government that takes life, liberty, or property unjustly—when the person has
not unlawfully infringed on those rights of another person—that is a tyrannical
government, which is the opposite of freedom.
Political freedom means living in a society in which our
God-given rights are protected rather than infringed. These would include
freedoms of belief and expression, such as freedom of religion and freedom of
the press, as well as freedoms of property and security, such as freedom from
illegal searches and seizures and the right to bear arms.
Liberty: synonym of freedom. It is ownership of one’s
own life, to pursue as one chooses, and to enjoy the fruits of one’s efforts.
No person or government or other entity owns a person or controls how the
person pursues happiness.
And yet, in today’s world, we have a rising generation that
favors a change from our system of freedom to a tyranny they might call socialism,
without knowing what that means either.
There’s another term that is useful here: Agency. Sometimes
we combine it with the word free, as in free agency. You’ve probably
encountered it when sports professionals leave a team and become free agents,
open to a contract with another team. That might be the limit of how you've
used it. But it implies the ability to choose. So you can see that agency is
related to liberty.
There are various words we use as opposites to the ability
to choose: coercion, oppression, tyranny.
When you look at a political ideology, you can simplify the
search for the good and true by looking at its closeness to freedom, liberty,
ability to choose—or by how dangerously close it is to coercion, oppression,
tyranny.
·
Do you get to believe what you choose to
believe?
·
Do you get to choose your profession and way of
life?
·
Do you get to speak your opinions freely?
·
Do you get to associate with people you choose
to associate with?
·
Do you get to enjoy the fruits of your own labors?
It wouldn’t be very convincing to offer you a truthful
opposite, such as: “Wouldn’t you rather believe what we the powerful tell you
to believe?” Or “Wouldn’t it be better for you if we the powerful decided what
work you were allowed to do and for what pay?” Or “Wouldn’t it be better if you
were allowed to speak only the words we the powerful told you to?” Or, “Wouldn’t
it be better for all of us if you gave us all your earnings and we the powerful
dole them out to those we favor?”
No, it has to be done more subtly than that:
· Let’s stop others from believing things that we
believe are just wrong—shut down churches, political groups, nonprofits, businesses,
schools, or any individual or organization that does or says things we don’t
like.
· Let’s stop others from making a living in ways
we don’t like—like using fossil fuels, or maybe just because the business
owners believe things we don’t like.
· Let’s cancel or coerce others to make them stop hurting us by saying things we don't believe—because their words are
violence.
· Let’s take the money from the rich and give it
to the poor, like us, who are more deserving.
You get the idea. To someone with some enlightenment, the “progressive”
or “woke” or “socially just” way is pretty dark. It takes away individual
choice. It oppresses individuals. It rules over people tyrannically. If that’s
OK with you as long as they’re on your side, not only is that evil of you, but
it’s also just a matter of time until the powers-that-be come after you for
some perceived infraction.
It’s a continuation of a very old war—a war that predates earth
history. It’s a war between good and evil, between light and dark. I told this
story here.
Let me tell another old story that maybe we can apply. Versions
of it show up in fantasy literature all the time. It’s from the Book of
Revelation, the last book in the Bible, chapter 13 mostly. But I’ll be retelling it in a slightly more
narrative form.
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| "La Bete de la Mer" tapestry in France, depicting John the Revelator observing the dragon and the sea beast image from Wikipedia |
There is an evil
force, in the form of a dragon, who is a scourge to all the earth. He is an
enemy to light, goodness. He doesn’t build; he destroys. Chaos and coercion are
his right- and left-hand weapons. He controls two monsters, hideous in form and
function, who do his bidding. One monster comes up from the depths of the
waters over all the earth. She is filthiness and all the worldly evils, and she rides and controls the
powers of rulers and organizations over all the earth. She seduces them with power, and brings
them together in secret oaths, so that they simultaneously threaten and support
one another in their schemes to amass greater and greater power, buying and
selling the souls of men.
The other monster
comes up from the earth. Its form appears much less dangerous than the dragon,
but it speaks with the tongue of the dragon. It voices the dragon’s words,
which are lies. Some call it the false prophet. Another interpretation might be
propaganda. It can be found flowing out of ivory and other towers, in and
through the airways—redefining in the dragon’s lying lexicon what is “good” and persuading people to worship the dragon, along with his beasts.
The dragon and
his forces will eventually lose in their efforts to harm and destroy all the
people of the earth. Bur for now the dragon marshals his forces, stirring them
up to larger and louder attacks, knowing his time is short.
What does it mean? Revelation, told in a sort of symbolic
dream form, can be confusing. But suppose it does say that there will come a
time when the organizations of the earth make secret agreements with one
another in an effort to amass power? Is that happening? I don’t think it’s a
conspiracy theory; it's not theory. You might try checking these out for a sample:
here, here, here, here, and here.
And about that propaganda monster—that seems like a good
explanation of how:
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| Rioters tear down statue of Father Junipero Serra in CA screenshot from here |
· Religion becomes “bad,” but lasciviousness and
licentiousness become “good.”
· Treating all lives as equally valuable becomes “racist,”
but favoring a particular race above all others is “social justice.”
· An elderly friend who suggests florists who
could help service a same-sex “wedding” when her religion prevents her becomes “intolerant,”
but taking away that woman’s business and savings for so doing is done in the
name of “tolerance.”
· Speaking reasoned opinions with data to back them
up becomes “hate speech,” but shouting down a speaker for even holding
different opinions is supporting “free speech.”
· Honoring a free nation and its flag is “hateful,”
but disrespecting the flag and tearing down monuments is understandable,
considering the circumstances.
You get the idea. Look at the news. Almost every story will
provide an example.
The lies appeal to a certain uncivilized human
characteristic: selfishness. If they’re working on you, or on someone you know,
selfishness is an underlying factor, often disguised as “this makes me feel
virtuous,” so you won’t look carefully enough to notice the lies.
Whether or not these are the times described in Revelation,
the description seems fitting for today. We may not know how each episode
will turn out, but we do know how the story ends.
In the meantime, let’s see how much loving truth-telling we
can do to rescue those who might want the light of freedom, prosperity, and civilization if only they could see it.
