Being Free, Reasonably

FREEDOM is much overrated in the United States, or, more properly, in American culture. We claim that it is the most important possession we have, but we are, as we Americans often are, being disingenuous. The very same people who prrotest in the streets that no government has the right to tell anybody to wear a facemask in the midst of the most deadly epidemic in American history gleefully elected a demagogue who tried to stay in power by overthrowing the government. when he refused to accept election defeat, tried to bully and use violence to overturn the election results, and his supporters supported his actions. On Jnusry the sixth neither Trump nor his followers were supporting anything remotely resembling "freedom". They were supporting criminality and violence. "Freedom", said Goethe, "is the opportunity to do what is reasonable under all circumstances." To protest violenty and openly deffy a government mandate so harmless, so necessary, so, helpful, and so temproaray as wearing a facemask in public, is not advocating the opportuity to do what is reasonable under all circumstances, it is attempting to subvert good, fair, reasonable government with chaos and anarchy which results in mass death. There seems to be a general consensus tht people should be free to decide whether to get a vaccination for Covid 19. Indeed, people shoudl be free to choose not to get vaccinagted for malaria, or tetanus for example. Anyone who believes that mosquitos cannot possibly do harm are free to believe this, to, as it were, roll the dice. Anyone sufficiently confident to believe that no sharp piece of metal can ever pepetrate his or her flesh is behaving with enough reason to be allowed this freedom. People who refuse the Covid 19 vaccine are not only putting themselves in harm's way, they are blatantly putting society at large at risk, especially those to whom they are closest, friends and family members. It is simply not reasonable, under any circumstance, for anyone to remain unvaccinated in a national epidemic in which than three quarters of a million Americans ahve already died, and more are dying each day. There is no religious, ideological, or health reason sufficiently persuasive, unless one's doctor says so. Then, refusing the vaccine becomes reasonable, becomes freedom, becasue the vaccine would be harmful. Government mandates allow for these exceptions. A friend of mine from England saye he is amazed at how easily and quickly Americans cry foul, and accuse their government of tyranny. A mask mandate or an attempt to secure voting rights on a national scale or spending tax payer money for programs for the poor is usually enough to evoke the wrath of fanatical freedom fighters. Tyranny, syas my english friend, is when one is toosed into the Tower of London, and the key is thrown away, for criticizing the ruling monarch. The English, with a long history of tyranny behind them, know what tyranny is. Americans simply do not. Nor, often, do Americans know the difference between "freedom" and social responsibility.