Liberty and Justice For All

Approval Rating, Freedom of Opinion, Balance, Social Justice, Ultimate Freedom

I.

Approval Rating

If you’ve been hanging around Earth for a while, you’ve probably realized that not everyone is fond of you. There are people who disagree with you, give you dirty looks, write nasty comments on your posts, and gossip behind your back. If you were running for President of the United States, some people would vote for the other guy—regardless of who the other guy is or what they stand for—just so they can avoid voting for you. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’ve accomplished, there will always be people who dislike you.

Put simply, you can’t please everyone. Regardless of how right or honest or kind you are, you’re bound to attract critics. That’s just how this world works. If your opinions please at least 50% of people, you’re doing remarkably well. Look no further than the last five presidential elections to see how this dynamic plays out in the political world: The highest public approval a candidate received in the past two decades was 52.93%, while candidates on average garnered less than a 50% approval (despite spending billions of dollars on campaigns to gain favor).

No matter what you do, no matter what you say, no matter who you are, you can’t please everyone. So you may as well show up in this world as your authentic self. You may as well stand up for your values and your autonomy. You may as well be who you are instead of trying to be somebody else. When someone unnecessarily criticizes you, brush it off. Remember that they’re part of the ~50% of people who will inevitably dislike you regardless of what you say or do. Their disapproval is a them problem, not a you problem.

Ultimately, what really matters is that you like yourself.

II.

Freedom of Opinion

We can never be sure that the opinion we are endeavoring to stifle is a false opinion, and if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still.

John Stuart Mill, On Liberty (1859)

When you present a thorough and well-researched idea backed by credible sources, you can still expect ~50% of people to disagree with you. That’s because we humans have human brains which are subject to this thing called an opinion. Objective truths do not come naturally or easily to our subjective brains, but opinions do. These 5 Big Ideas are, indeed, opinions. Letters From an American is full of opinions. Lenny’s Newsletter is full of opinions. The Bulwark is full of opinions. There are as many opinions out there as there are people.

As Laura Kennedy writes in her latest opinion piece, “Everyone is free to have a bad take.” And while some people don’t agree with what I have to say, I still have the right to say it. I wouldn’t try to deprive someone else of that right because I wouldn’t want it to be taken away from me.

In my opinion, we know far less about Life, the Universe, and Everything than we think we do. Some of the beliefs we currently hold will, in time, turn out to be wrong. Just five centuries ago, Nicolaus Copernicus first challenged the notion that the Sun rotates around the Earth. The Catholic Church attempted to conceal Copernicus’s ideas for nearly 100 years when Galileo Galilei came around and built upon the Copernican theory. Despite the Catholic Church issuing a decree prohibiting the teaching of heliocentrism, Galilei continued his work and published the Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems anyway. Because the right to personal liberty was not universally recognized or protected during the Renaissance era, Galilei was forced to recant his views and spend the rest of his life under house arrest—simply because he suggested that the Earth rotates around the Sun.

The Founding Fathers, influenced by Enlightenment ideals, regarded personal liberty as essential to preventing tyranny, fostering a vibrant democracy, and enabling individual pursuit of fulfillment. Influenced by John Locke’s political philosophy, the U.S. government was founded on the principle that personal liberty is inherent and inalienable. In other words, liberty is not granted by government; it’s protected by it.

III.  

Balance

Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It ever has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.

James Madison, The Federalist, No. 51 (1788)

Let’s break down Founding Father James Madison’s quote into more modern speak:

Justice is the end of government

This means that the “end goal” of government is to achieve justice.

It is the end of civil society

This means that the “end goal” of civil society is to achieve justice, too. (Government is merely a tool through which society pursues its own ideal.)

It ever has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained

This means that the pursuit of justice has always been and always will be. Our father’s father’s father’s father sought justice, and our daughter’s daughter’s daughter’s daughter will continue pursuing it. Seeking justice is like trying to find the answer to the meaning of life—it’s an elusive ideal that is just out of reach.

or until liberty be lost in the pursuit

Now comes the warning. There’s a delicate balance between Justice and her sister, Liberty. If the pursuit of justice is taken to extremes, it could result in a loss of individual freedom. In which case, justice is lost too.

IV.  

Social Justice

We live in an unjust world. The world was unjust before humans showed up, and it continues to be unjust despite our efforts to construct social structures aimed at achieving justice. Here are some examples of how injustice plays out:

• More than half of U.S. adults do not have enough emergency funds to cover an unexpected $1,000 expense, while Bezos, Musk, and Zuck are collectively worth over $600 billion

• Slave laborers and children risk their lives mining cobalt in the Democratic Republic of Congo so that people in first-world countries can have iPhones and Teslas

• Billions of cows and chickens are hormonally defiled and slaughtered each year, while cats and dogs live in our air-conditioned homes and sleep on our couches

• The list goes on ad infinitum

Justice issues are highly emotional issues. We feel sad, angered, and afraid when we see injustice unravel around us. Issues like climate change, discrimination, gender equality, LGBTQ+ rights, refugee rights, access to healthcare, mass incarceration, and global poverty and hunger are among the top social justice issues receiving attention these days. As highly connected and informed individuals, we witness these issues online and often hyperfixate on them, attaching our emotional state to their outcomes. But these issues only control our feelings if we relinquish control to them. We have the ability to control our emotional state, not some outside event. We can choose to continue living, learning, and growing despite the injustices unfolding around us.

This is not to say that the outcomes of social justice issues are unimportant. They are very important—and that’s why the social structures whose end goal it is to achieve justice are working on these issues. What’s truly worrisome is the number of people who’ve become debilitated over these issues. If you want to stand up for a cause and effect change, be pragmatic about it. Keep in mind that the result may not end up being the equitable one or the one you want. But whatever you do, don’t use social justice outcomes as a reason to give up on your own life—the only thing you actually have control over. Don’t distract yourself from your own problems by hyperfocusing on the problems of the world. The world is not your problem; your problems are your problem. By making your emotional state contingent upon outside events, you give up your power. This is doing yourself and the world a disservice. You should not be so devastated by external outcomes that you refuse to function. When you focus on fixing your own problems, your world (and the world) improves as a result.

V.  

Ultimate Freedom

Democracy originates from the Greek dēmos, meaning “common people,” and kratos, meaning “rule, strength.” A democracy is “a system of government in which the sovereign power is vested in the people as a whole exercising power directly or by elected officials”¹ because the common people are powerful.

You are powerful. I am powerful. We are powerful.

Yet, we’re quick to give up our power. We shift the blame to others instead of taking responsibility for our actions. We conform to cultural norms that do us more harm than good. We do things “the way they’ve always been done” rather than creating innovative solutions. We strive for external achievements at the expense of our own values. We compare ourselves to others instead of recognizing our own worth.

A well-functioning democracy is one comprised of people who think for themselves. A thriving society is one made up of autonomous individuals who uphold their own views while respecting the rights of others. A healthy person is one who is true to herself.

---

I’ll leave you with this final opinion:

The whole theory of the universe is directed unerringly to one single individual—namely to You.

Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (source)

1. Democracy (Etymonline)