Life can be scary, and the prospect of death even scarier. It can be overwhelming to look around and realize that the safety nets that protected us as children were all relative to a child’s perception, and that a very thin veil separates us from disorder, chaos, or even death. Life may not be a “right”, but a privilege granted to us by the countless forces in the universe that haven’t happened to snatch it away quite yet… but could, at any moment.
Maybe many of you feel safer under the umbrella of an authoritarian state, but I think the safety afforded by that umbrella is also a matter of perception, and while I support any individual’s right to be controlled to the extent of their wishes, I don’t support them having the power to make that decision for anyone else, save those who’ve forfeited their rights by violently infringing on others’. Clearly, the vast machines we build to protect us can just as easily pull us into their gears, crush us beneath their treads both at home and abroad, and bleed the coffers dry in the process.
Freedom* and Liberty* will never be absolute in a world of flawed and fallible people, but the weight of that asterisk and the length of its footnote is up to you. Any system that doesn’t offer an option to opt out, or claims more ownership over the individual than that individual has over themselves, is nothing but a gilded cage with the illusion of choice.