freedom isn't free

Why my recent obsession with reframing the political debate? Free will is something I value more than almost anything. However, we can't have free will if we don't understand what our choices are. George Lakoff writes, "At stake here is the deepest form of freedom -- the freedom that comes from knowing your own mind. If you are unaware of your own deep frames and metaphors, then you are unaware of the basis for your moral and political choices..."

As a far-left progressive, I've tended toward the idea that compromise is weak. We should stand up for our beliefs and not apologize—Americans deserve freedom from harm and, therefore, the government should provide high quality healthcare for all. Recognizing the need to reframe the debate ties into my no-compromise positions, but it allows for the more pragmatic among us new freedoms, too. The freedom to know our minds and make informed choices. Perhaps more importantly, this new information also helps me realize that real freedom is progressive (systemic, empathetic).

Understanding that someone next to me can hear the words freedom, liberty, opportunity, or harm and those words will have entirely different meanings than they do for me is essential. Even more urgent, though, is realizing how much the radical right over the course of my lifetime (in the last 30-40 years) has co-opted the language using uncontested notions of the words to change how even I hear the words. For example, when I hear "fairness," now, I automatically think "but life isn't fair, we can't require or expect fairness." That's not what fairness used to mean to me.

Some highlights I've been returning to as I work to reframe ideas in my own mind:

• There are no "self-made" men or women in America. We all depend on the commonwealth's infrastructure.
  
• Historically, American freedoms are progressive freedoms.
  
• Our military is an occupying force in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  
• We need freedom from religion. No individual or institution has the right to force feed their religious views onto me or my children.
  
• Guided by empathy, progressives are responsible for themselves and others recognizing the deep connections among individuals and systems.
  
• Progressives support freedom from want, freedom from fear, freedom from injury or abuse.
  
• The uncontested metaphors for freedom are freedom of movement and freedom from restriction. Progressives know that if our neighbor's freedoms are restricted, we all suffer.

Progressives need to take back the meanings of freedom, opportunity, and liberty. We can only do this not by screaming about the immorality of the radical right, but instead we need to reframe the debate. We mustn't use their language in the discussions. Going on the defensive only reasserts the validity of their frames.

Freedom isn't free. We invest in freedom with our tax money. We are blessed to live in a country where every person has a right to live a free life thanks to the commonwealth we all provide.


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which baby's life would you save?

Let's say you believe life begins at conception. Personally, and by that I mean for me, I believe it does. We'll start with that assumption. In fact, let's just agree with the Republican Platform where they "affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed...and we endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children." Additionally, all Republicans who receive support from the national party believe this. Let's be Republicans for a moment here. Not right-wing-extremists. Just Republicans, moderates, left-leaning, even. But we are Republicans who are receiving support from the national party. So. Life begins at conception. Got it? Okay.

Here's what I encourage you to consider.

The house is burning down. In the room most consumed by flames there is a three year old child, screaming, crying, pleading for your rescue. Next to the child is a petri dish containing live human cells about five days after fertilization, at the blastocyst stage. They are about to be transferred into the waiting mother that evening. You are only able to save one of these babies.

Which baby would you save?

Why?

How would you feel if you could only save the younger baby?

How would you feel if you could only save the older baby?

How are those feelings different?

Now, a second story for your consideration.

Again, a fire is consuming the building. In the room, engulfed in flames is a crying infant. A newborn, just hours old. Next to that baby is a woman, comatose or in a "vegetative" state. All medical personnel have agreed she will never wake up. She is, however, carrying a baby inside her. She has almost reached full term. Most reasonable people would describe her as having a baby inside of her. If it were born now, it would survive.

There is no time, though, to take time for considering your options. You will either save the crying newborn, or the effectively dead woman and her live baby.

Which baby would you save?

Why?

How would you feel if you could only save the younger baby?

How would you feel if you could only save the older baby?

How are those feelings different?

Probably, when faced with this sort of decision you feel even more serious discomfort. Perhaps you are the sort of person who simply can't deal in hypothetical questions or think they are pointless. That's fine. Don't do it. If you are like me, the conflict is so great a choice seems impossible.

You see, as most of us recognize, abortion is complicated. And, you may see in that first example, there is a point where most reasonable people will put the life of the born child before the unborn child. The second example is more complicated, but, if you are anything like me, you might lean toward the born child. It's even horrible and shameful just typing that.

If you vote for a Republican, though, no matter how moderate or centrist, if they have support from the national party, you are voting for someone who has said in writing they believe those cells in the petri dish have as much a right to life as that crying toddler. Either they believe this, or they lied to get the support of their party.

The Republican party is run by extremists who don't speak for most Americans. We progressives have done a horrible job exposing their immoral behavior.

If you know someone who believes Republicans stand for family values, please ask them to talk with their representatives. Have they signed the Republican platform? Do they believe in what they signed? Or, were they lying so they could get the support of the party?

Cells in a petri dish = a toddler. Or, lying just to get elected.

Those are the choices for Republicans.


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rally to restore sanity/fear: the Hello Kitty of activism

While on my brief—a whole week!—hiatus from blogging (which I plan to go back into until the next idea compels me to share), the "Rally to Restore Sanity/Fear" happened in DC. If you didn't catch Jon Stewart's speech, I found it worthwhile. Here is the text and here's the video:

There were lots of jokes going around about "what is this rally really for/about?" No one had a good answer. I think the answer is in the absence of an answer.

In the book "Buying In: The Secret Dialogue Between Who We Are and What We Buy" Rob Walker spends some time on the "Hello Kitty" product. With the mouthless—and therefore expressionless—face, it is a blank slate. Hello Kitty becomes what the consumer wants it to be. In fact, that's true of everything we purchase. Who we believe we are, our self-perceptions, come first. We put our own meanings onto anything we buy. Additionally, we make our purchasing choices using both our desire to be individuals and our desire to belong.

I still haven't sorted out what kind of effect I think the rally might have, whether it's ultimately a good or bad thing, whether it's a sign of a re-engaging (or newly engaging) populous, or if it's a demonstration that people want an easy way out.

Because it came in a one-size-fits all form, like the Hello Kitty doll (was it ironic? was it pure? was it just for fun? was it inspirational?), I'm not sure anyone will be able to state with authority what the Rally was all about. It was the ultimate expression of so much of our modern day America: it means what it means to me. Whether that meaning includes other people, community, or the wider society depends entirely on the individuals.

I found this mash-up of Jon Stewart's words based on the frequency with which they appeared in his speech interesting:

My initial impulses are to feel positive about the Rally because I've seen more people excited about "issues" than ever before, even if their issue happens to be "look! we can be nice people" or "look! we can make fun of people who misspell signs." There's something beneficial, I believe, about activity in general. That inertia issue... maybe people went to DC because it seemed like it'd be a blast, but maybe they'll end up doing something after this to help improve the lives of people around us. I don't know. I do know that the entire framing of the event was from a "nurturing parent" morality frame: empathy and pleasure are strengths. That of course leaves it wide open for the radical right (and everyone they've purchased, including the Tea Party movement) to dismiss as "the liberal elite" doing their holding hands kum-ba-yah pointless, weak, ineffective, un-American, etc... thing.

Since I believe most of America is actually deeply progressive, I hope seeing this many people who care in one way or another—and that is the issue, that "caring" isn't weakness—might encourage others who have lost hope or find themselves needing to blame the "big bad government" might take another look at who is really screwing things up for us. That is, the greedy mega-corporations and their convoluted relations with government officials. Break those relationships up, legislate against greed, and things can change for the better for everyone no matter how well they can spell.


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supporting the Republican platform means you support incest perpetrators

She was only ten when he started coming in to her room at night. "Just let me lie with you," her Daddy said.

By the time she was sixteen they had sex once a week when her Mother was at the gym. Sometimes more often when her Mother was out of town.

The week before she went to college she found out she was pregnant. She had been with no other men. Only her Father.

The Republican platform would require this girl to carry that child to term. She would have no other legal or safe options.

Some of the Republicans who stray from their party's official platform might require her to go ask her parents for permission to get an abortion. Imagine her asking her mother or father that question.

Abortion is complicated. No one thinks it is a simple issue. No one has clear answers. No honest person really believes it is ever easy.

Surely, though, we can all agree that this child abuser, this perpetrator of incest, this "Father," shouldn't have more rights than his daughter? Should she be forced to spend nine months carrying that baby?

The Republican platform says she must.

For those of you who so desperately cling to the idea that, "Oh, that's just the freaks on the far right, *real* Republicans understand there are situations where a woman should have a right to an abortion," consider this: Any Republican who wants to get financial support from the party must sign the platform. So, if they want to have the support of the Republican party they either they agree that abortion is always wrong, or they are liars.


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