America participates in the greatest social ideas, namely that each individual is equal under the law and that opportunity should be available to all. We don't always live up to those, but we do try, and we often get it right.
Those ideas aren't a zero-sum game. All nations can take part.
I'll just add that while I was traveling and living in Europe, while the people are free in many ways, there were fewer protections to various liberties such as privacy and what we would call Due Process.
It depends on which rights you value more (as in, "I can tolerate more violations of my privacy as long as I have better protection of my free speech rights," etc.) when making a determination as to where to live and where you might rank the amount of freedom in a given place.
Personally, I like it better here, and I think there is an objective argument to be made that we have better protections for various liberties here than in other places.
Of course, that argument gets harder to make each day as other places imitate us and we chip away at various freedoms through "PATRIOT Act" type laws and other restrictions passed by both parties.
I'll just add that this video irks me because it's usually posted as some bit of amazing honesty and clarity, and proper thinking vs. oversimplification by both extremes of the political spectrum, but it's an oversimplification as well.
The glaring example is the comment: They have freedom in _______, ____________, and ___________ too!
Yes, they do. But that glosses over what I touched on above: Which liberties do they protect, how much, and how strong are the protections?
Yes, the Netherlands is very free in many ways. They've adopted a very libertarian stance on drugs and sex, but they arguably don't have as much freedom as we have here with regards to religion. (E.g. if you work for the government as a cop, you have to take off your crucifix or hijab before work.)
There's definitely room to not call people idiots for having subjective preferences of which of these is better, and we could go on and on trying to argue which is objectively better.
The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth. H. L. Mencken
Here's my answer:
ReplyDeleteAmerica participates in the greatest social ideas, namely that each individual is equal under the law and that opportunity should be available to all. We don't always live up to those, but we do try, and we often get it right.
Those ideas aren't a zero-sum game. All nations can take part.
Well said, Greg.
DeleteI'll just add that while I was traveling and living in Europe, while the people are free in many ways, there were fewer protections to various liberties such as privacy and what we would call Due Process.
It depends on which rights you value more (as in, "I can tolerate more violations of my privacy as long as I have better protection of my free speech rights," etc.) when making a determination as to where to live and where you might rank the amount of freedom in a given place.
Personally, I like it better here, and I think there is an objective argument to be made that we have better protections for various liberties here than in other places.
Of course, that argument gets harder to make each day as other places imitate us and we chip away at various freedoms through "PATRIOT Act" type laws and other restrictions passed by both parties.
I'll just add that this video irks me because it's usually posted as some bit of amazing honesty and clarity, and proper thinking vs. oversimplification by both extremes of the political spectrum, but it's an oversimplification as well.
DeleteThe glaring example is the comment: They have freedom in _______, ____________, and ___________ too!
Yes, they do. But that glosses over what I touched on above: Which liberties do they protect, how much, and how strong are the protections?
Yes, the Netherlands is very free in many ways. They've adopted a very libertarian stance on drugs and sex, but they arguably don't have as much freedom as we have here with regards to religion. (E.g. if you work for the government as a cop, you have to take off your crucifix or hijab before work.)
There's definitely room to not call people idiots for having subjective preferences of which of these is better, and we could go on and on trying to argue which is objectively better.
The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth.
ReplyDeleteH. L. Mencken
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