—You can't have your cake and eat it too.
Have you ever considered some of the more subtle nuances of freedom?
In Tao, An Enduring Ancient Wisdom, I argued that freedom was
a commodity, an intangible commodity that operates in a manner that is
diametrically opposed to tangible goods in that it is not devalued if
its quantity increases. It is immune, in other words, to that most basic
of economic laws, that of supply and demand.
In this essay I am going to discuss the notion that there are actually
two different kinds of freedom, and if you enjoy one you may not partake
of the other.
The two kinds of freedom that I refer to may be described as technological
and natural.
We currently enjoy (if not utterly wallow in) technological freedom. We
have modern marvels (like automatic washers and automobiles) that free
us from the drudgery that the thousands of generations before us had to
endure.
But our mastery of technology has been acquired at the expense of natural
freedom. What is natural freedom? My favorite way to think of
it is in terms of something that has lately become a virtual fantasy.
There was a time (and not so very long ago) when it was not such a whimsical
vision.
The sheer dream that I refer to consists in the ability to step
outside your door and set off on foot in pretty much any direction you
please and do nothing more than take a walk, and do so without the fear
of trespassing on someone else's property.
On this score, I give you the master himself, Henry David Thoreau:
I can easily walk ten, fifteen, twenty, any number of miles, commencing
at my own door, without going by any house, without crossing a road except
where the fox and the mink do: first along by the river, and then the
brook, and then the meadow and the woodside. There are square miles in
my vicinity which have no inhabitant. From many a hill I can see civilization
and the abodes of man afar. The farmers and their works are scarcely more
obvious than woodchucks and their burrows. Man and his affairs, church
and state and school, trade and commerce, and manufactures and agriculture
even politics, the most alarming of them all -- I am pleased to see how
little space they occupy in the landscape. Politics is but a narrow field,
and that still narrower highway yonder leads to it. I sometimes direct
the traveler thither. If you would go to the political world, follow the
great road, follow that market-man, keep his dust in your eyes, and it
will lead you straight to it; for it, too, has its place merely, and does
not occupy all space. I pass from it as from a bean field into the forest,
and it is forgotten. In one half-hour I can walk off to some portion of
the earth's surface where a man does not stand from one year's end to
another, and there, consequently, politics are not, for they are but as
the cigar-smoke of a man.
—(from Walking)
Our acquisition of technological freedom has, in my opinion, come at a
great price. From my perspective, it appears that technology has virtually
incarcerated us. Our prison bars are not so apparent though. They are
quite deceptive in the manner of their presentation. But however deceptive
they may appear, they are yet made of the same materials as the more commonly
known ones (and just as effective).
I refer to the prison of concrete and steel that fences us all in. Our
prison bars are the streets, highways and sidewalks that surround us,
and demarcate the landscape of our individual cells.
Technology has given us a certain kind of freedom, a freedom that we take
great pride in describing as precious, but my personal issue
with it goads me to ask a rather pesky question:
What are we doing with this precious freedom?
Yes, I value it as well as the next man. But if it is indeed so precious,
why are we not doing something precious with it? When I take a hard and
honest look at American culture, I do not see a whole lot of activity
going on that I could truly describe as precious. No way. My hard look
at America reveals to me nothing but the crassness and crudity of the
marketplace. In America, it's all about the money. (The business of America
is business.)
And on the subject of money, I find myself asking the very same question
as the one I direct at freedom: what are we doing with it?
In this case, however, I target only those who have excessive amounts
of it. And I find that I see the same thing (when I observe what the rich
do with their excessive wealth) that I see when I note what we all do
with our excessive freedom: self indulgence. I do not see the
rich doing anything that I would call precious with their excessive wealth,
any more than I see the masses doing the same with their excessive freedom.
In both cases, I see only self-gratifying frivolity and silliness. I see
nothing profound, only something shallow.
The so-called free market has a way of totally destroying quality.
Do you honestly regard a television show like Hee Haw as an example
of quality? Or American Idol? And what about our obsession with soap
operas and professional sports? Are these instances of quality? All of these
forms of shallow entertainment have one thing in common: sensationalism. The
marketplace thrives on sensationalism, not quality.
And what about the rich and their multiple residences and various collections,
like garages filled with classic automobiles? Do you regard this as an
example of doing something precious with their economic clout? I see it
as nothing but indulging in the purely selfish. Can we in good conscience
acknowledge that which is only selfish as a form of quality?
I am sure that many will respond to this question by noting that our precious
freedom is indeed precious for that very reason, that it allows us to
indulge ourselves in whatever manner we please, be it selfish or otherwise,
so long as we do not touch someone else with our activity.
To which I must respond that we are touching others through our
selfish activities, whether we sense it or not, especially if those activities
involve the use of resources, which are increasingly threatened by the
ever-burgeoning pressures of population growth.
As the popular refrain has it, it's a small world. It is increasingly
difficult to do anything without somehow touching someone else with your
behavior, which simply underscores the validity of my basic claim in this
essay, that we are all severely deprived of natural freedom in the present
world of technological empowerment. It is a relentless, indomitable power
that has effectively weakened us, virtually forcing us into a small corner
of our concrete and steel room, where we may do nothing but exercise our
freedom to seek ways to distract ourselves from the reality of its inexorable
sway over us.
February 14, 2008