At times it may not seem as though we are as free as we can be, yet by comparison we are some of the most free people in the world. We have no fear of our government seizing control of our lives, we have no fear of a government spewing lies with no alternative source of information, we have no fear of our government at all. The Constitution has protected us for centuries, and has never failed us. We have suffered through knee jerk laws and asinine regulations designed to keep us safe, but through it all we fought to maintain our freedoms. Even a small faction of freedom lovers can overcome insurmountable forces, as is seen in the American Revolution. From this world changing revolution the seeds of freedom were planted in all areas of our lives.
Our freedom of expression goes deeper than just the press and news outlets. We are granted full rights to actively offend* people, if that is what we want to do. The protection of every point of view is what differentiates the United States from other countries with state run, and censored, news. In these countries it is hard for an outsider to discern truth from fabrication, and as such we are kept guessing at that country's motivations.
Take North Korea for example, it is difficult (not impossible) to wade through the bull to determine what is actually taking place. Even in our beautiful American freedom we still find in necessary to wade through fabrications and nonsense to get to the deeper issues in news.
During each and every Presidential election I have witnessed there is some type of mud slinging that aims to discredit an opponent or to sway public opinion. There is little we can do to combat this deformation campaigning but with the advent of the websites like Snopes we are better able to determine fact from fancy. The most recent Presidential election found me alternating between fact checking and laughing at Smiling Joe Biden. It is situations where we are forced to look outside the passive, and often invasive, news organizations that we grow as a country.
By entering the discussion of facts and opinions we become more rounded, more informed, and more capable of making decisions based on the greater good. These opportunities to discuss life, politics, religion and all other hot topic issues are necessary to our growth as a culture. We, as a nation, cannot afford to bowl alone, we need to open more channels to express our opinions and ideals. This is something that is most efficiently done in a country like ours, where speech is not limited, speech is not censored, and there is a facet for every view point imaginable.
*I was going to put a link to the Westboro Baptist Church, but I didn't want them to get ANY traffic from my Blog. Just know that they actively preach hate, which is in direct opposition to the teachings of Jesus Christ. They are no more Christians than I am an Iguana. They give the rest of us Christians a bad name.
No comments:
Post a Comment