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Sad shyt but all facts...
Why Freedom Became Free-Dumb in America
Why Freedom Became Free-Dumb in America
By now, you might have heard North Dakota is the world’s worst Covid hotspot. The world’s worst, with South Dakota not far behind. Things aren’t just desperate there — they’re bizarre, at least to the rest of the world. Nurses talk about patients in the Covid ICU lashing out at them because…they don’t believe Covid exists…while they’re dying of it. Meanwhile, the governor refuses to make mask-wearing mandatory, because she thinks that masks and lockdowns don’t work. You might think all that would infuriate Dakotans, but quite the opposite is true: they’re firmly behind her, as they are Donald Trump, the President who let Covid spin out of control, and make North Dakota the world’s worst Covid hotspot.
What the?
The rest of the world is staggered by all that, because it is staggering. How many twisted levels of illogic are even in there? Too many to count. People in the world’s worst Covid hotspot dying of Covid who don’t believe Covid exists so they won’t fight Covid and back a President and Governor who’ve just let it explode. It’s so awesomely weird that you can’t really find this level of backwardness and folly anywhere else in the world, which is exactly why Dakota is the world’s worst Covid hotspot. But it’s not just North Dakota. Nine of the ten world’s worst Covid hotspots are American states.
And that is because something went badly, badly wrong in America.
In these states, which are mostly red states, Americans have become effectively martyrs for a certain idea of freedom. They are willing to sacrifice anything — and I mean anything — including themselves, their families, their health and wealth, their futures, their towns and cities, and their democracy. But what good is freedom if it’s just the right to…self-destruct?
America became obsessed with free-dumb: the idea of freedom as the removal of all restraint, the right to harm others, the ability to do anything you please, no matter how destructive, toxic, foolish, or inane. Covid’s a jaw-dropping example of it. Think about the example above: it involves at least three levels of free-dumb. The right to “believe” Covid doesn’t exist, the right not to have to wear a mask, the right not to have to lock down. All these effectively add up to the idea that Americans should be free to infect anyone they please with a lethal disease. What on earth?
Where does this amazingly, jaw-droopingly stupid idea of free-dumb come from? Covid’s hardly some kind of anomaly. It’s part of a larger pattern. Americans — in the vast, vast majority — think of freedom in a way that by now the rest of the rich world and much of the poor one regards as dangerously backwards. Freedom is the right not to ever have to cooperate, to invest, to act for the common wealth or common good.
Why is America the only rich society in the world that doesn’t have effectively any public goods? No functioning healthcare, retirement, higher education, and so forth? Because of free-dumb. “I won’t pay for their healthcare, education, retirement!!” Why not? “They’re weak! They’re liabilities and burdens!! They cost me money!!” But wait, don’t you understand that means you won’t have those very same things yourself — because such social institutions are for everyone? “I don’t care! I won’t reward weakness and laziness! Such people need to be punished! And I should be free not to have support the weak!”
So goes the logic of the average American. The idea of free-dumb is something like this. Freedom means a gun, a beer, a Bible, and no rights for women and minorities. But textbooks and medicine and good food and water — those take away your freedom.
What the? How did Americans end up believing this incredible level of self-evident nonsense? How can a gun and a Bible give you freedom, while a book and medicine take it away? What on earth happened to this society to make it actually accept this insanely depressing and foolish kind of backwardsness?
I’ll come to that in a moment. First, you might think I overstate the case. Do I? After all, something like 70% of Americans say they want all the things above. The problem is that they never vote for them. Nope, not even this time around. Democratic voters made Biden rise to power, not Liz Warren or Bernie Sanders, who were the ones championing Americans having basic public goods. Yet again, Americans chose free-dumb. And it’s crucial to note that choice cuts across the left-right divide. Sure, the right onlysupports free-dumb. But on the centre and the left, free-dumb is dominant, too. Free-dumb so dominates American thinking, society, ideas, culture, life, that Americans have never not chosen it.
To make it clearer just how bizarre and twisted this notion of freedom really is, think about what happens when you cross a border — an imaginary line — into Canada, or take a short flight to Europe. There, freedom has a completely different definition — one that’s diametrically opposed to American free-dumb. Canada and Europe are famous for the world’s most expansive, sophisticated social contracts. Citizens enjoy everything from healthcare to education to retirement to childcare and more.
Why? Americans don’t understand — even the ones who consider themselves intelligent, even the educated ones — just why social democracies like Canada and Europe cherish these things so much that they provide them to everyone, no questions asked. They don’t understand the logic at all, because nobody has ever explained it to them, even attempted to usually, and so free-dumb goes right on having an iron grip over American life, making it as stupid as humanly possible.
The logic of why Canada and Europe provide basics to all goes like — it’s about freedom, but in a much, much deeper, more elegant, thoughtful, sophisticated, and beautiful way than Americans understand. If I am fighting for the basics — bitterly battling everyone else for the food, water, money, medicine, to survive, what does that make of me? I become embittered, hostile, angry, resentful. I grow callous and cruel. I become suspicious and distrustful and isolated and alone. I don’t grow as a person — I shrink and wither into my worst self. The Greeks would have said: I grow weak, morally, intellectually, socially, culturally. And people weak like that are not capable of sustaining a democracy.
What happens, on the other hand, if I do have the basics? Then I’m free. Not just free in the superficial, narrow American way: free to have stuff. I’m free in an existential, social, emotional, cultural, human way. I’m free to cultivate, develop, nurture higher values and virtues. I can be trusting, kind, generous, empathic. I can be thoughtful, critical, reflective. I can be humble and warm and appreciate beauty and truth. I am free to be a genuinely good person. Human goodness has been freed in me.
You might think all that sounds dramatic and overblown, but let me assure you, as someone who’s lived in America, Canada, and Europe — it’s not. Think about how Canadians are renowned for their gentleness and kindness. Or about how Europeans are known for their thoughtfulness and expansiveness and decency and closeness as societies. These things I’m speaking of aren’t abstractions, and they’re not my opinion. They are lived human realities that happen in these societies every single day.
Now think of how the world regards Americans, by contrast.It thinks of them, mostly, as idiots. As cruel, abusive, selfish, exploitative. As narcissists obsessed with the superficial aspects themselves. As violent dummies — people more likely to have a a gun than a book. As bigoted and superstitious — people who think they can pray the gay and the Covid away. I know that sounds harsh, if you’re American.
But is it untrue?
Go ahead and take a hard look at Americans’ behaviour during Covid. It’s been, in a word, shocking and abysmal. Sure, “not all Americans” as the saying goes. But America, as a society, hasn’t exactly done itself proud. Quite the opposite. As a society, Americans acted just the way the world imagined them to be: selfishly, ignorantly, violently, cruelly. Like spoiled, overgrown children throwing the world’s biggest tantrum. How else did America end up with the world’s worst Covid numbers? Precisely because people wouldn’t cooperate with lockdowns and masks, or demand them.
Covid showed that social norms and values of basic decency, kindness, thoughtfulness, care, concern, consideration don’t existin America. You might think I’m just name-calling — but I’m trying to actually point out a deeper truth.
Norms of basic decency and humanity and gentleness and empathy and care and so on don’t exist in America precisely because Americans aren’t free to be and do those things.
What the?
The rest of the world is staggered by all that, because it is staggering. How many twisted levels of illogic are even in there? Too many to count. People in the world’s worst Covid hotspot dying of Covid who don’t believe Covid exists so they won’t fight Covid and back a President and Governor who’ve just let it explode. It’s so awesomely weird that you can’t really find this level of backwardness and folly anywhere else in the world, which is exactly why Dakota is the world’s worst Covid hotspot. But it’s not just North Dakota. Nine of the ten world’s worst Covid hotspots are American states.
And that is because something went badly, badly wrong in America.
In these states, which are mostly red states, Americans have become effectively martyrs for a certain idea of freedom. They are willing to sacrifice anything — and I mean anything — including themselves, their families, their health and wealth, their futures, their towns and cities, and their democracy. But what good is freedom if it’s just the right to…self-destruct?
America became obsessed with free-dumb: the idea of freedom as the removal of all restraint, the right to harm others, the ability to do anything you please, no matter how destructive, toxic, foolish, or inane. Covid’s a jaw-dropping example of it. Think about the example above: it involves at least three levels of free-dumb. The right to “believe” Covid doesn’t exist, the right not to have to wear a mask, the right not to have to lock down. All these effectively add up to the idea that Americans should be free to infect anyone they please with a lethal disease. What on earth?
Where does this amazingly, jaw-droopingly stupid idea of free-dumb come from? Covid’s hardly some kind of anomaly. It’s part of a larger pattern. Americans — in the vast, vast majority — think of freedom in a way that by now the rest of the rich world and much of the poor one regards as dangerously backwards. Freedom is the right not to ever have to cooperate, to invest, to act for the common wealth or common good.
Why is America the only rich society in the world that doesn’t have effectively any public goods? No functioning healthcare, retirement, higher education, and so forth? Because of free-dumb. “I won’t pay for their healthcare, education, retirement!!” Why not? “They’re weak! They’re liabilities and burdens!! They cost me money!!” But wait, don’t you understand that means you won’t have those very same things yourself — because such social institutions are for everyone? “I don’t care! I won’t reward weakness and laziness! Such people need to be punished! And I should be free not to have support the weak!”
So goes the logic of the average American. The idea of free-dumb is something like this. Freedom means a gun, a beer, a Bible, and no rights for women and minorities. But textbooks and medicine and good food and water — those take away your freedom.
What the? How did Americans end up believing this incredible level of self-evident nonsense? How can a gun and a Bible give you freedom, while a book and medicine take it away? What on earth happened to this society to make it actually accept this insanely depressing and foolish kind of backwardsness?
I’ll come to that in a moment. First, you might think I overstate the case. Do I? After all, something like 70% of Americans say they want all the things above. The problem is that they never vote for them. Nope, not even this time around. Democratic voters made Biden rise to power, not Liz Warren or Bernie Sanders, who were the ones championing Americans having basic public goods. Yet again, Americans chose free-dumb. And it’s crucial to note that choice cuts across the left-right divide. Sure, the right onlysupports free-dumb. But on the centre and the left, free-dumb is dominant, too. Free-dumb so dominates American thinking, society, ideas, culture, life, that Americans have never not chosen it.
To make it clearer just how bizarre and twisted this notion of freedom really is, think about what happens when you cross a border — an imaginary line — into Canada, or take a short flight to Europe. There, freedom has a completely different definition — one that’s diametrically opposed to American free-dumb. Canada and Europe are famous for the world’s most expansive, sophisticated social contracts. Citizens enjoy everything from healthcare to education to retirement to childcare and more.
Why? Americans don’t understand — even the ones who consider themselves intelligent, even the educated ones — just why social democracies like Canada and Europe cherish these things so much that they provide them to everyone, no questions asked. They don’t understand the logic at all, because nobody has ever explained it to them, even attempted to usually, and so free-dumb goes right on having an iron grip over American life, making it as stupid as humanly possible.
The logic of why Canada and Europe provide basics to all goes like — it’s about freedom, but in a much, much deeper, more elegant, thoughtful, sophisticated, and beautiful way than Americans understand. If I am fighting for the basics — bitterly battling everyone else for the food, water, money, medicine, to survive, what does that make of me? I become embittered, hostile, angry, resentful. I grow callous and cruel. I become suspicious and distrustful and isolated and alone. I don’t grow as a person — I shrink and wither into my worst self. The Greeks would have said: I grow weak, morally, intellectually, socially, culturally. And people weak like that are not capable of sustaining a democracy.
What happens, on the other hand, if I do have the basics? Then I’m free. Not just free in the superficial, narrow American way: free to have stuff. I’m free in an existential, social, emotional, cultural, human way. I’m free to cultivate, develop, nurture higher values and virtues. I can be trusting, kind, generous, empathic. I can be thoughtful, critical, reflective. I can be humble and warm and appreciate beauty and truth. I am free to be a genuinely good person. Human goodness has been freed in me.
You might think all that sounds dramatic and overblown, but let me assure you, as someone who’s lived in America, Canada, and Europe — it’s not. Think about how Canadians are renowned for their gentleness and kindness. Or about how Europeans are known for their thoughtfulness and expansiveness and decency and closeness as societies. These things I’m speaking of aren’t abstractions, and they’re not my opinion. They are lived human realities that happen in these societies every single day.
Now think of how the world regards Americans, by contrast.It thinks of them, mostly, as idiots. As cruel, abusive, selfish, exploitative. As narcissists obsessed with the superficial aspects themselves. As violent dummies — people more likely to have a a gun than a book. As bigoted and superstitious — people who think they can pray the gay and the Covid away. I know that sounds harsh, if you’re American.
But is it untrue?
Go ahead and take a hard look at Americans’ behaviour during Covid. It’s been, in a word, shocking and abysmal. Sure, “not all Americans” as the saying goes. But America, as a society, hasn’t exactly done itself proud. Quite the opposite. As a society, Americans acted just the way the world imagined them to be: selfishly, ignorantly, violently, cruelly. Like spoiled, overgrown children throwing the world’s biggest tantrum. How else did America end up with the world’s worst Covid numbers? Precisely because people wouldn’t cooperate with lockdowns and masks, or demand them.
Covid showed that social norms and values of basic decency, kindness, thoughtfulness, care, concern, consideration don’t existin America. You might think I’m just name-calling — but I’m trying to actually point out a deeper truth.
Norms of basic decency and humanity and gentleness and empathy and care and so on don’t exist in America precisely because Americans aren’t free to be and do those things.