May I pose to you a question?

Let me first state that this question was not created by me it is an excerpt from ‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra’, a book written by Friedrich Nietzsche. I found it very compelling and one that had me look deep within my inner being to create a full understanding of the answer which I would provide. Maybe it will not mean much to you but I do ask that you please think hard about it for not many questions are so truly compelling.

“You call yourself free? Let me hear your ruling thoughts, and not that you have escaped bondage. Are you one who deserved to escape from it? There are many who threw away their only worth when they threw away their servitude. Free from what? Why should Zarathustra care? Your eyes should answer plainly: free for what?”

Think about all that is quoted above. Do not post an immediate response for that is not desired.

reply to post by Misoir


Freedom. I say I am free. I make my own decisions, live a life I want to live. Raise my children how I see fit.

Others may see me a slave. From what I say, the decisions I make, the life I lead, how I raise my kids.

Freedom is as much a point of view as it is an actual expression of the individual.

Interesting thread.

reply to post by Misoir

“You call yourself free? Let me hear your ruling thoughts, and not that you have escaped bondage. Are you one who deserved to escape from it? There are many who threw away their only worth when they threw away their servitude. Free from what? Why should Zarathustra care? Your eyes should answer plainly: free for what?”

Interesting, I will think about it for a bit and get back to you on it.

reply to post by Misoir


Dear Misoir

I just love it.

Someone and I really wish it where me once said.

“freedom is another word for nothing left to lose”

What a wise man, it just had to be a man.

Very, very few people are truly free.

You need a gun or to be really good with a bow and arrow and you need to get way out of town. Then you are a slave only to the elements and your health.

Then you are as free as it is possible to be in this life.

Just love it keep it up.

reply to post by Misoir


No, I am not free. A vast majority of what little time I have in existence is allocated to making a profit for someone other than myself. I work for someone else almost every day to be able to buy food that I could grow myself, pay for a building that I live in that I could have built myself, pay for energy that I could generate myself, buy clean water that I could collect and purify myself, and if I'm really lucky, at the end of the week, I may have just enough left over to afford a little bit of entertainment.
Now, when I break my bonds and am able to provide all of this for myself will I be free? And if I am free, will I have thrown away my only worth, that of being a cog in the machine that is society, when I become free of it? The answer that I give myself to this question is a resounding, NO! I was not "born for the stables" as Baudelaire said of some. I do DESERVE to escape my bonds and I will be free of them. Free to exercise my will to make my life more meaningful, to better myself, and all that I influence.
This question has a great deal of validity, and should certainly be pondered by anybody who considers themselves to be "free"...
S&F,
Q&A

Originally posted by MAC269
reply to post by Misoir

 

Dear Misoir

I just love it.

Someone and I really wish it where me once said.

“freedom is another word for nothing left to lose”

What a wise man, it just had to be a man.

Very, very few people are truly free.

You need a gun or to be really good with a bow and arrow and you need to get way out of town. Then you are a slave only to the elements and your health.

Then you are as free as it is possible to be in this life.

Just love it keep it up.

Janis Joplin. id it. Sang it.

When I am free of time .. I will be truly free

reply to post by beezzer


Dear beezzer

I think I can just about top that one with this clip bellow.

www.youtube.com...

Do you remember the seen outside the hippy commune Easy Rider about 1968 or 9?

I took Heather Biggs to see that the trouble is I still thought it was for staring my tea with.

Those guys had it right but we all got old.

Originally posted by MAC269
reply to post by beezzer

 

Dear beezzer

I think I can just about top that one with this clip bellow.

www.youtube.com...

Do you remember the seen outside the hippy commune Easy Rider about 1968 or 9?

I took Heather Biggs to see that the trouble is I still thought it was for staring my tea with.

Those guys had it right but we all got old.

Can't watch the video from where I am, but I do remember.
And yes, sometimes I feel too damned old.

The only time I really feel free, is when it's just me and my motorcycle, pushing it to the limits. In those moments I feel free. No one telling me what I can and can't do, no problem with my brain not wanting to shut up, in the present totally. That is freedom, no one can touch me there. Free to ride.

reply to post by beezzer


Dear beezzer

Yea well just think of that clip while in the back row of the cinema with a really good looking Mona Lisa 18 years old imagine Mona Lisa as a playboy center fold.

Nope. I don't think I'm free. I live in supposedly a country
that is supposed to represent freedom. I'll probably piss alot of
Americans off for saying so, but this America is not free.
I've traveled a bit. Europe several times, Australia, and Canada.
Enough to say I have a little experience, anyways, with some other cultures.
I'm sorry, but America is seriously warped. Sometimes you don't know
how bad it is til you can see a contrast.

The biggest contrast I could see was in values. I saw it especially in the
Europeans. They value their families and their own well being above work.
Above their employers. Above the almighty dollar. They just seem to
celebrate and enjoy life over there more then we do over here. In America
we work. And then we buy. And we feather somebody's nest...We are seeing
more rioting and more protests in Europe because they are so much more aware of
what they are losing. In America we say "Sorry, I gotta pay my bills...".

In defense of my beloved country I will say that we have been hijacked. Someone
has spent hundreds of billions of dollars studying us, learning what makes us tick,
how to manipulate us,influence our thoughts, habits, and opinions. But most of all
how to trick us into believing what we are seeing is real and that our thoughts are
our own. And on top of spending all that money, some of these people have been
meeting in secret for hundreds...maybe thousands of years...studying, sharing secret
knowledge, planning ...or doing god knows what. The point is they've been doing it
a long time and we're idiots if we think they've been resting on their laurels.

Every day I see the horrific evidence of the conditioning that evil is good. That right
is wrong and wrong is right. EVERYDAY I see evidence that I am being lied to. I see
my friends, my family, everyone giving in to the lie.We make concessions and tell ourselves
what we're seeing is really ok when it's not ok... We get up and go to work
every day, maybe even work we don't necessarily ethically agree with but we gotta pay
the rent. We buy overly priced unhealthygenetically modified organisms we call food.
We're bombarded every day with fear, war, murder, rape, child abuse and neglect, corruption,
lies, we're told what is good,bad, beautiful, ugly, patriotic, acceptable, unacceptable, worthy,
unworthy...And then when it becomes damn near impossible to live in your own skin we've got
antidepressants, narcotics and alcohol...
And then of course there's my runaway out of control government...

I pray other countries will take some of these things into account when judging America..

No other country on earth is more enslaved then America. So no, I don't think I'm free. I'm not even sure if
my thoughts are my own.

reply to post by TKDRL


Dear TKDRL

Ok I am sure whit you there but you can not come from the UK, they have the thought police there.

Nature is free. A slave only unto the universe as a whole. Modern =/= Natural.

I feel as though I am free. I may be delusional, but if I am...so what? Does it really matter if I really am free or not as long as I think and act as if I am? Freedom is what you make of it and how you live your life. You can be a slave or you can be a master...of yourself.

/TOA

Because

Unfortunately we cannot be truly free with our current government and especially our tax system Taxes, especially property taxes, enslave every man woman and child in this nation. For me a big part of true freedom would be a plot of land that I work with my own hands to provide my own food, water and power without fear of losing my property at the whim of a capricious government. Unfortunately property taxes make true property "ownership" impossible. If you owned the land, you would not have to pay yearly "rent" to the government. Since you must pay the property tax in legal tender, you must have a source of income thus enslaving the vast majority with some sort of job. Without property taxes, we could work just long enough to buy our desired plot and then follow our own desires; so long as we harm no one else.

I am "free" at least enough to be happy and productive.

I am "slave" only enough for society to continue to function.

This is a good trade off, and the basis of the Social Contract. Now I know that is a completely loaded philosophy here and that Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau are pretty well hated by a lot of you "patriots" but that is the basis for Western society.

Like it or not, this is in fact the case, and Nietzsche for one didn't like it so he threw little intellectual temper-tantrums about it and eventually went completely insane. Good for him, it must have been a very liberating experience to loose grip on reality.

Originally posted by sonofliberty1776
Unfortunately we cannot be truly free with our current government and especially our tax system Taxes, especially property taxes, enslave every man woman and child in this nation. For me a big part of true freedom would be a plot of land that I work with my own hands to provide my own food, water and power without fear of losing my property at the whim of a capricious government. Unfortunately property taxes make true property "ownership" impossible. If you owned the land, you would not have to pay yearly "rent" to the government. Since you must pay the property tax in legal tender, you must have a source of income thus enslaving the vast majority with some sort of job. Without property taxes, we could work just long enough to buy our desired plot and then follow our own desires; so long as we harm no one else.

My plan to get around this is to donate my land to my not for profit organization specializing in teaching sustainable agriculture and off-grid self sufficiency. This way, I'll be able to live as freely as a man can, at least until they decide that anybody who doesn't support their system is a terrorist and pull a Waco on me. Come next spring, I'll be making the move to said land and starting all this up. I can't wait. We'll see how I answer this question once I accomplish my goals.

reply to post by Misoir

I have given it some thought.
I am not sure how my ruling thoughts pertain to freedom, because they are "ruling" thoughts, I am ruled by them, and I cannot say where they come from, specifically those generated when I become bored. I have a desire to learn, and alternatively to teach as well.
I believe we are free, most of us, that aren't physically locked up. I am free to create life and to take life away. I am free to work, or not to work. I can gorge myself, or fast.
I don't see how you can get much freer than that. Life guarantees nothing, not even life.