[lbo-talk] Taking Liberties

Robert Wrubel bobwrubel at yahoo.com
Fri Jul 27 04:50:29 PDT 2007


In America, I've always felt that "freedom" was unconsciously understood by ordinary people to mean "freedom to consume." When used by politicians particularly it's a code word for our privileged lifestyle, a way of saying "we got here first, mates, and we're going to enjoy it."

"Freedom" is not about political freedoms at all, hence it's perfectly consistent with a totalitarian state, as long as we are content with the consumer life and don't concern ourselves with those left out of it.

BobW

--- Russell Grinker <grinker at mweb.co.za> wrote:


> 'New Labour flushed liberty down the toilet'
>
> Chris Atkins, director of new documentary Taking
> Liberties, talks about
> freedom, fear and how the government is making us
> all 'stand in the naughty
> corner'.
>
> Interesting review by Brendan O'Neill which argues,
> among other things that:
> We live in an era of Doublespeak. In Britain,
> 'freedom' is proclaimed from
> the rooftops, while our real freedoms to protest,
> speak openly and choose
> how we wish to live our lives are going up in smoke.
> Everywhere you look,
> the f-word is celebrated: on bogroll packaging, in
> air freshener ads, in
> speeches by politicians who manage to dress up their
> assaults on freedom as
> new freedoms. Freedom is paid lip service while
> simultaneously being stabbed
> in the back - a mixed metaphor, I know, but then
> this is a mixed-up state of
> affairs.
>
> At:
>
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/printable/3673/
>
>
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>
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>



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